Reestablishing Trust
by animalcrazy10102
Summary: Following the events of his fourth year, Harry began to change, and five years later, Voldemort's heir dies, but who is the stranger found in Azkaban shortly after? And what really happened five years before? AU after GoF.
1. Default Chapter

Chapter 1-Tragic Turns  
  
It was the beginning of their fifth year when it started to happen. Ron and Hermione were the first to notice the change, and it was they who informed Sirius and Remus along with the headmaster, and their revelation caused worry among all of the adults alike, but none did anything to change what was happening, they all thought he would return to normal, but they were wrong, and they would come to dread the decisions they had made.  
  
Ever since the events of the third task of the triwizard tournament, Harry Potter became a boy that no one really knew anymore. He cut himself off from his friends, his headmaster, and his godfather, and was never seen in the presence of any other students while he was at school. No one had received any word from during the summer before his fifth year, but they all believed that his relatives were preventing him from communicating with the wizarding world like they had done in the past, and they blamed his shift in personality on the events of the previous year, not even thinking it could be anything else but that. During the entirety of his fifth and sixth years alike, Ron and Hermione had tried all they could think of to get their friend back to normal, but nothing worked, and even the headmaster was having no luck. Sirius stayed at the castle for periods of time between missions and tried to speak to his godson as well, but he too failed, and eventually, they all began to give up hope, and by the end of his sixth year, Harry Potter was completely alone, as everyone thought that the only person who could help him out of his drastic change was himself. Their decision, however, caused another thing to happen instead, and Harry Potter did the last thing anyone ever expected of him, a thing that caused the entire wizarding world more pain and suffering than anything in the past had ever done, they lost their hero. Rumors began to spread when Harry didn't return to the school for his seventh year, and no one was able to track him down until just before Halloween of that year.  
  
Snape had returned from one of his meetings with the dark lord and other death eaters and went immediately to the headmasters office where he knew a meeting of the Order of the Phoenix was being held, and without even knocking on the door, he burst in and found himself the object of attention of the eleven other members of the circle. Lupin and Black were both there, as well as the two eldest Weasley sons and their parents, Arabella Figg and Mundungus Fletcher, Minerva McGonagall, Mad Eyed Moody, and the headmaster.  
  
"Severus, what is it?" asked the older man in concern when he had taken in the potions masters anxious expression  
  
"I was called, Voldemort was marking his new recruits" began Snape hesitantly, his usual sneer missing as his eyes flickered momentarily to those of his one time rivals, the remaining two marauders.  
  
"Who has joined?" asked Dumbledore, although it appeared that he already knew the answer  
  
"Crabbe, Goyle, several graduates of Durmstrung, Malfoy, and.Potter" answered Snape quietly as he locked his eyes with the headmaster  
  
"Are you sure?" asked Sirius after several minutes of stunned silence had passed  
  
"Yes, the dark lord said that Potter was to be his heir, his second in command, and Potter looked all to willing and happy about this" he responded and upon hearing the words, the ex convict dropped his head heavily into his hands  
  
"Could he have been under the imperious curse?" asked Charlie Weasley, but it was Remus who answered  
  
"Unlikely, he has been able to throw it off since he was in his fourth year"  
  
"How could Harry, of all people, join him?" asked Sirius in disbelief  
  
"Unfortunately, Sirius, as you know, Harry has changed a great deal in the past couple of years, no one has been able to reach him no matter what we tried. We are still uncertain as to what exactly happened to him in that graveyard, but whatever it was caused him to change his perspective on this war" said Dumbledore sadly  
  
"What does this mean, though, Albus? How will we defeat both Harry and you- know-who? They are both incredibly strong wizards, we need an advantage over them, but what?" asked McGonagall once the shock had worn off for her  
  
"I'm afraid that this means that our only advantage over Voldemort is now our enemy" said the headmaster finally after several minutes of deep thought, and the other members of the order, sensing the utter hopelessness of the situation all fell into silence as well, each lost in their own thoughts about the savior of the wizarding world joining forces with those who wished to destroy it.  
  
Within mere weeks of Snape's announcement, the entire wizarding world had found out about the betrayal of the boy-who-lived, mainly due to the fact that Harry lead all of the death eater strikes, the only one brave enough to attack without his face masked from view. In addition to this, it was he who fired the killing curse at the minister of magic in front of over a thousand ministry workers during one of his speeches, smiling the entire time before he vanished with a pop.  
  
At first, it was hard for his friends to believe he could betray them so terribly, until they saw him with their own eyes torturing a family of muggles. Ron and Hermione had both joined the war efforts immediately after their graduation and were often sent out on missions together and were well known as some of the best fighters on the light side, but even their combined efforts couldn't stop their one time best friend when he was on a rampage and they were barely able to dodge the unforgivable curses he sent in their direction when they were unlucky enough to meet him on the battle field. Harry killed and tortured without remorse, no matter who his victim was, no one was out of his reach.  
  
Under the dark lords tutoring, he became even more powerful than his parents had been, and he was quick in surpassing the level of all of the other death eaters and it was obvious that he could be a very powerful wizard once he reached his full potential, but he wasn't quite there yet, and all those fighting him prayed he would never reach that level.  
  
For the next three years, bloodshed was a common sight all over the English countryside, with no end of the war in sight, but one dark night, things turned in favor of the light with the most unpredictable of circumstances, Harry became lazy and overly confident.  
  
Sirius, Remus, and Snape had been alerted to a plan to attack a small muggle town on the coast and left with a dozen aurors to stop the atatck. None of them had seen any sign of death eaters for a little over a week and were dreading the intense battle that they knew was about to take place, but they weren't prepared for the small group of dark wizards that showed up, expecting many more. Due to the advantage of surprise, it took mere minutes for them to stun the six wizards, but the shock was yet to come when Harry stepped out of the shadows, creeping toward a house on the corner, completely unaware of the fact that he was now alone and completely out numbered. He had succeeded in placing a muggle man under the cruciatus curse when Sirius managed to sneak up behind him, his wand pointed right at his godson's head and his heart beating wildly in his throat at the knowledge that only one of them was going to leave alive.  
  
"Drop the wand, Harry" he ordered calmly, though his eyes betrayed the sadness that he felt  
  
Slowly, the nineteen year old turned to face his godfather, but he kept his wand on the screaming man "Why should I?" he asked conversationally, his face an impassive mask and his brow furrowed in confusion, but there was something strange about his expression.  
  
All in all, Sirius had only seen his godson up close a few dozen times, all of them before Harry had joined Voldemort, and Sirius had been pardoned, but he had seen James so much, and he had looked so similar to his son that it was easy to place them as family. Harry, though, looked slightly different than Sirius had expected him to. His physical features were exactly as he had imagined them to be, but as he looked deep into his eyes, he saw a touch of something he had never seen before, but before he could place it, Harry had turned to face him more fully, but kept his wand on the muggle man.  
  
"Because if you don't, I will not hesitate to kill you" answered Sirius tersely  
  
"You would never be able to follow through with it, so let me save you the trouble, Black" he said as he turned his wand on the older man, his attention completely off the muggle now.  
  
What happened next was hard to say, Harry fired the killing curse at his godfather, but Sirius jumped out of the way and the green beam of light hit the mirror he was standing in front of and an instant later, Harry Potter was lying still on the ground, his once brilliant emerald eyes wide and his face frozen in complete shock. Just then, Remus and Snape entered the house and their eyes went wide when they took in the sight before them.  
  
"Is he.?" asked Remus finally  
  
"Yes" answered Sirius, his angry eyes starring straight at his godson "Let's get out of here, I can't stand looking at him after everything he has done" he said as he turned his back on all that remained of his best friend, the son who betrayed them all and caused more than a thousand deaths in the last two years alone. Mutely, Remus followed his best friend out, levitating the muggle behind him so that his memory could be modified and his injuries tended to while Snape levitated the body of the boy-who- lived into the street where he cast a burning spell on it to prevent the remains from being found and used by the dark lord.  
  
Minutes later, they had all apparated away with the six stunned death eaters. Word spread quickly through the wizarding world about the death of Harry Potter, and many took the opportunity to celebrate, seeing this as the turn of the tides in favor of the light side, but several had heavy hearts with the death of one they had called a friend for so long.  
  
~*~*~*~*~*~*~~  
  
A/N: Here we go, new story, let me know what you think of it so far! 


	2. Azkaban, Prison of the Forgotten

Chapter 2-Azkaban, Prison of the Forgotten  
  
Two months later, a tip was received that Azkaban, the fortress that Harry had used as his main operation area, had been abandoned and the death eaters and dementors stationed there had moved to the former ministry of magic building where Voldemort resided. Long rumored to be the location of those who had been captured during the past years of war, the Order of the Phoenix was more than anxious to examine the fortress for any sign of those who had been captured, Mundungus Fletcher and Minerva McGonagall among them. Both had been taken nearly four months before and there was little hope that they would be found alive, but the other order members were willing to look just in case.  
  
Due to his experience with the prison, Sirius volunteered to be among those to search the island, and Remus was quick to join him. It had been decided to send no more than two into the prison, just in case the rumors were false and death eaters were still present, a small group was more likely to escape than a larger one.  
  
Remus and Sirius apparated to the edge of the coast and flew brooms to the fortress, each in possession of a portkey that would take them immediately back to the Forbidden Forest surrounding Hogwarts, and as they approached, they were met with nothing but complete and utter silence from within its walls. Quickly, they dismounted off their brooms and crept toward one of the back doors where they silently entered. The fortress was three stories tall with a dungeon below it, all made of plain gray stone and housing a feeling of despair for any who looked upon it, and Remus looked to his best friend, not surprised to see a look of hard determination on his face despite the memories he must be experiencing at that moment and he felt a great amount of admiration for Sirius being able to return to his former prison.  
  
They met with no guards on their journey as they silently but thoroughly checked the upper three floors of the prison, finding only empty cells. They had both expected this, because according to Sirius, the high security cells were in the dungeons, those on the upper stories were for lesser crimes, those prisoners were allowed sunlight, fresh air, and were only visited by the dementors once a day, or at least that's how things had been when the ministry was in charge. He didn't have to say anything, but Remus knew that he had been kept in the dungeon, and he had been allowed very little time without dementors, but he knew this without asking, as it was a topic of conversation that would never be addressed. They then descended the staircase into the dungeon, and here they heard the first sounds of life in the form of quiet breathing and the occasional moan from several of the cells lining the damp main corridor.  
  
The dungeon was comprised of a large main aisle made of the same gray stone that was present throughout the rest of the prison, and off of this main aisle were four smaller corridors, each containing four cells. The main aisle contained nearly twenty cells, and it was here that they began their search.  
  
The first cell they came to, they were relieved to find a familiar brown haired figure curled up in the corner, trying his hardest to avoid the sight of whoever had entered.  
  
"Gus?" asked Sirius quietly at the sight of the other man, who upon hearing his name raised his head quickly, allowing Sirius and Remus to make out the dark bruise on his cheek and several small cuts, but all in all, he looked quite good for having been a prisoner of the dark lords for four months, if not a good deal thinner and quite weary.  
  
"Black? Is that you?" he asked in disbelief  
  
"Yeah, Remus too" answered Sirius with a relieved smile as he walked toward the man and helped him stand "Do you know where Minerva is?" he asked once they had made it into the slightly brighter hallway.  
  
"Last I saw her, she was in the cell across the way there" he answered as he pointed to the cell directly behind Remus. The werewolf immediately spelled the door open and entered the cell, emerging a few minutes later with an equally tired but overall healthy looking, given the circumstances, women leaning on him.  
  
"What happened, how did you get in here?" she asked quietly  
  
"The death eaters abandoned the prison when the figured out that Harry wasn't coming back" answered Sirius  
  
"Not coming back? Are you saying what I think you're saying?" asked Fletcher in disbelief  
  
"Yes" answered Sirius tonelessly as his eyes traveled up and down the long corridor "You two wait here, we're going to go see if there is anyone else alive down here" and with that, he and Remus set off down the corridor, checking every cell they came to as their counterparts settled against the wall in relief.  
  
They found a total of six other people alive, but another sixteen weren't so lucky, before they came to the last cell, at the end of the last side aisle. Quickly, they opened the door and entered the dark chamber, their eyes easily picking up the form that was sitting in the corner of the room on a decrepit looking bed.  
  
"Hello?" said Remus hesitantly  
  
"Have you come to get us out of here?" asked a hopeful voice, and a very youthful sounding one at that  
  
"Yes" answered Sirius "Who are you?" he asked as his eyes adjusted to the sudden light from Remus' wand, although not much, it helped and he was able to make out the form of a small girl, probably no more than eight looking at him intently. She was wearing very dirty purple robes and her dark brown hair was braided in pigtails, stained with mud and dust as well.  
  
"Jessica Rice" she answered promptly as she got to her feet and walked to Sirius and Remus, much steadier than any of the other survivors they had found so far.  
  
"It's good to meet you, Jessica" said Remus with a smile on his face as he held out his hand to the small girl "Why don't you come with us so we can get you out of here" he said and she smiled shyly as she took his hand and allowed herself to be led from the small cell, but once in the aisle, she stopped abruptly and looked to Remus and Sirius in concern.  
  
"Did you rescue him too?" she asked as she pointed back in the direction of the wall at the end of the hallway  
  
"Who?" asked Remus, puzzled  
  
"The one who made the bad men mad so much" she answered seriously  
  
"You were the last person down here, Jessica, there is no one else" answered Remus as he tried to urge the girl forward by gently pulling her small hand.  
  
"No, he's still here, I know it!" she yelled frantically "You have to save him too" she said as she pulled her hand free of Remus and ran to the stone wall "You have to say the password or it won't open" she explained, and Remus and Sirius decided to at least humor the girl for the time being to see if she was indeed telling the truth.  
  
"Do you know what the password is, Jessica?" asked Remus as he knelt down in front of the girl  
  
"Tom Marbado Ribble" she answered promptly, facing the wall that didn't budge with an annoyed expression on her face, but Sirius and Remus both felt their eyes go wide at her words and Sirius faced the wall himself.  
  
"Tom Marvolo Riddle" he almost whispered, and to his amazement, the wall began to slide away silently, revealing another stone corridor with one cell at the very end "Jessica, stay here, ok, we'll be right back" he told the small girl who nodded as he and Remus hesitantly entered the corridor and walked to the room at the end.  
  
"Alohomora" said Remus as he directed his wand at the row of locks, and immediately, the door swung open and a thin sliver of light spread over the dirty floor "Lumonos" he whispered and instantly, the entire room was bathed in pale light, and they both felt their breath catch in their throats at the sight that met their eyes.  
  
Against the far wall, with his back to them, was a person who could be described in no other way than terrible looking. He was wearing black robes, but little of the original fabric remained, the rest was shredded and hanging limply on the thin frame. His hands were stretched out over his head and chained to the frame of the bed he was lying on, preventing very little movement on his part.  
  
Hesitantly, the two men approached the form, and they were both relieved to see that he was breathing, even though it was shallow and uneven. Remus set to work immediately trying to free his hands from the chains while Sirius tried to awaken him or figure out who he was. He gently shook the figures back "Come on, wake up, we have to get you out of here" he said quietly, but he was becoming more worried when he received no response from the person.  
  
There was something strange about him and the entire ordeal, but the ex- convict was unable to place it so he continued trying to wake him while he took in his terrible condition. His hair was the darkest of black and hung in a bloody and matted mess over a good portion of his face, and the skin that was visible through the torn robes was pale and drawn tight over the bones, many of which appeared broken through the thin layer of blood and dust that covered them, making him appear more dead than alive, but Sirius pushed those thoughts away as he tried again to coax him awake. A few moments later, he noticed that the figure had begun to shiver slightly, and feeling sorry for his current state, Sirius removed his thick winter cloak and draped it over the others shoulders carefully.  
  
"Got it" said Remus finally as his arms fell free of the restraints, even though they were still bound together, and they were able to roll the man onto his back, an action that caused the cloak to slip accompanied by a gasp of pain. Quickly, Sirius bent over and retrieved the cloak and wrapped securely around the person again, not noticing that he was awake.  
  
"Who are you?" he said in a painful sounding voice, startling both men from their thoughts.  
  
"Professor Lupin, and this is Professor Black, we teach at Hogwarts" said Remus hesitantly, aware of the fact that he was loosing the boy's attention quickly, and this was due to confuse him even more than anything else "What is your name?" he asked, but he didn't receive an answer, but instead a small chuckle  
  
"It sure took you two long enough, where have you been?" he asked in a raspy voice that began to fade before he fell into unconsciousness, allowing the other two men to look to one another in confusion.  
  
"Who is he?" asked Remus finally after it became obvious that he was indeed unconscious once again.  
  
"I have no idea, but we'll have to wait until we get back to Hogwarts to find out" said Sirius as his eyes traveled over the bruised and bloodied face, trying in vain to figure out who it belonged to. 


	3. Fury of the Truth

Chapter 3-Fury of the Truth  
  
"Come on, the others are waiting, we'll figure all of this out back at the castle" said Sirius again after they sat in silence for another several minutes as he knelt down beside the unconscious figure and carefully gathered him into his arms, surprised at how light he was, before standing and leading his best friend from the room. When they reached the main corridor, Remus was pounced on immediately by Jessica.  
  
"You found him!" she exclaimed happily "Who is he? Is he going to be ok? Why is he sleeping?" she asked in rapid succession as she pulled on the werewolves robes in her excitement  
  
"Yes, we found him, but you need to be quiet so he can sleep, he is very tired" said Remus gently as he took her small hand in his own  
  
The group walked quickly back to the other eight survivors, and they were pleased to see everyone had remained in the same place they had left them and were looking slightly more alert and hopeful than they had at first, and upon seeing their rescuers, Fletcher and McGonagall jumped to their feet.  
  
"Sirius, who are they?" asked the transfiguration professor asked immediately as she took in the form in his arms and the small girl holding Remus' hand.  
  
"This is Jessica, and we were hoping you could help us figure out who he is" said Remus  
  
"How could I help?" asked McGonagall in confusion  
  
"Do you know of any Aurors or order members who are unaccounted for?" asked Sirius  
  
The woman furrowed her brow in thought for several minutes before she shook her head "None that I know of, why?" she asked in confusion.  
  
"Because we found him in a hidden cell, and neither of us recognize him, we were hoping one of you would" said Sirius hopefully as he moved forward and allowed the other professor and Fletcher to look at the stranger he was holding.  
  
"Do you recognize him?" asked Sirius, and she immediately looked to his bruised face with a look of contemplation upon her own  
  
"There is something familiar about him, but I'm not sure who he is" she finally admitted  
  
"I thought the same thing" said Sirius quietly  
  
"Well, whoever he is, he certainly was treated a lot worse than the rest of us, he doesn't look like he should be alive" said Fletcher, and several of the aurors nodded in agreement "How long do you think he's been here?" he asked as he looked to Sirius and Remus  
  
"No idea" answered Sirius heavily  
  
"Come on, let's get back to Hogwarts, maybe the headmaster will know who he is" said Remus finally after several minutes of silence  
  
Without another word, the members of the group all touched the portkeys Remus and Sirius held out and an instant later, they had all disappeared form the prison, the unconscious man still in Sirius' grasp.  
  
When they arrived at the gates of Hogwarts, the weary group of witches and wizards hurried up to the castle silently, praying they would make it before they were seen by any of the death eaters that had been known to hide in the forbidden forest. As they finally reached the great oak doors, Remus muttered the password and they swung noiselessly open and they entered in single file, Remus and Jessica in the lead and Sirius and the unknown man bringing up the rear since they were the only two with wands. When the doors closed behind them, they all let out a heavy sigh of relief and several of those rescued leaned against the cool stone walls and Sirius readjusted his grip on the man.  
  
"Thank goodness!" exclaimed a voice from the top of the marble staircase and they all turned to see none other than Albus Dumbledore descending the stairs toward them "Minerva, Gus, I'm so glad to see that you are alive" he said honestly as he shook both of their hands and smiled broadly at the other members of the group, most of which were aurors who had been captured, before he looked to Remus and Sirius "And, what might I ask is your name?" he said as he kneeled down to Jessica's level.  
  
"Jessica Rice" she answered shyly, her earlier boldness gone in the face of the large, unfamiliar castle.  
  
"Where are your parents, Jessica?" asked Dumbledore kindly  
  
"Gone, the bad men took them away" she answered with tears in her blue eyes "Then they took me to the little room and told me that I was going to be raised as one of them"  
  
"It's ok, now, Jessica, we'll take care of you and the bad men will not hurt you anymore" reassured Remus as he gave the small girl in his arms a hug and she let silent tears fall onto his robes. Dumbledore then turned to look at Sirius.  
  
"Who is that, Mr. Black?" he asked with his brow furrowed, but it was McGonagall who answered him  
  
"We're not sure" she answered quietly, earning a shocked look from the older man who then turned his attention back to Sirius  
  
"Where did you find him?" he asked in concern  
  
"In a hidden cell, Jessica had heard the death eaters going in there and told us about it and what the password was. He was chained to a bed and unconscious when we got there, but he woke up for a minute and asked who we were, and when we told him, he laughed. We tried to find out who he was, but he lost consciousness after he asked us what took so long to get there" he answered quietly "We don't know who he is, but there's something familiar about him, we just can't place it, but he's in pretty bad shape. Do you know who he could be?" he asked hopefully, and everyone else fell silent as the old man cautiously stepped forward and brushed the matted hair from the boys' face before he took him from Sirius' arms, showing incredible strength for one so old.  
  
After several silent moments his eyes widened marginally "It can't be" he gasped quietly before he raised his wand and muttered a cleaning spell, removing the blood and dirt from his face and revealing several dark bruises and small cuts, and with the absence of the filth, the rest could see that whoever the headmaster was holding was still quite young, probably a teenager despite the lines left from who knows how much torturing. But the headmaster ignored those and instead looked to the boy's forehead, where a scar in the shape of a lightning bolt was plainly visible now "Harry" he whispered, and that single word almost caused Sirius to pass out in shock.  
  
"What?" he finally managed to ask and that seemed to be the question on everyone else's mind as well as they all starred from the scar to the headmaster and back again.  
  
"I don't know how, but it appears that Harry Potter isn't dead, that this is him" answered the aged man heavily "We will just have to wait until he wakes up in order to find out what has happened here. Sirius, why don't you follow me up to the infirmary, the rest of you should go see the doctors from St. Mungo's, they're in the chamber on the third floor tending to the survivors of the last battle, Remus, could you please go and watch over the students in the great hall until the other professors arrive" he said as he turned to leave  
  
"No, this traitor deserves no medical attention, we should just kill him and be done with it before he can do any more damage" said Sirius suddenly, his entire body trembling with suppressed rage and his wand out and pointing at the unconscious figure in Dumbledore's arms.  
  
"Sirius, please, lower your wand. Nothing will be done to this boy until he has awoken and had a chance to tell us his side of the story. I will not allow you to kill an innocent child in your anger" he said firmly  
  
"Ha! Innocent?! INNOCENT!? You call this little traitor innocent after all that he has done?! I don't' believe it! He is responsible for the deaths of over a thousand people Albus! He is the right hand and the heir of Voldemort and you call him innocent!" Sirius screamed hysterically, his wand arm trembling  
  
"Sirius, think about what you are saying, you saw that person die, Severus burned his body, there is no way that this is the same person, that boy is dead, yet this one is very much alive, now we must find out who he is and how he came to bear Harry's appearance since the Harry Potter we all know died two months ago, in front of your eyes. Now, please come with me to the infirmary" he all but ordered and the other man had no choice but to follow, no one refused an order from Dumbledore, no matter how angry they were or what the circumstances were.  
  
When they reached the infirmary, Sirius stopped in the doorway while Albus continued on his way and just looked at the person he knew was lying as still as death on the bed furthest from the door, hidden from view by the door that was partially closed in a room usually reserved for staff members, the person who bared a face that brought so many emotions into his head all at once that he didn't know what to think. He felt anger, and resentment, betrayal, and no small amount of hurt, but along with these, he also felt a small shred of relief and hope, and even the love that he used to feel when he thought of his godson, before everything started to go so terribly wrong. He stood there for a long time just looking at the partially closed door and thinking over all that had happened in the past five years, completely oblivious to the conversation that the headmaster and mediwitch were having just a few meters away from him until he heard Harry's name spoken and he forced his feet to carry him to the pair, if for no other reason than to satisfy his own curiosity.  
  
Dumbledore looked up when Sirius reached him and greeted him with a nod before he turned back to Poppy "What have you been able to tell from examining him, Poppy?" he asked quietly.  
  
"Nothing much more than the obvious" she began with a heavy sigh as she massaged her temples wearily "He has defiantly been tortured for quite some time, he had quite a few broken bones that I have healed, as well as several deep cuts. Whoever he is, he has had a rough time of it though" she said as her eyes met those of the headmaster.  
  
"What do you mean?" he asked hesitantly  
  
"Well, while it was examining him, I saw that his entire back, chest, and arms are completely covered in scars, too many for me to remove them all without sending his system even further into shock right now. Judging by those alone, I would say that he had been there for at least several months, probably longer" she said quietly  
  
"Who is he though?" asked Sirius finally, his voice thick with emotion and his eyes betraying his fear of what he was about to hear.  
  
"There is no way to tell for sure until he wakes up, but based on the records I had on Mr. Potter from his time at the school, it most certainly could be him, they match perfectly until the end of his fourth year, from the third task on, there are too many discrepancies to make a positive ID of him" she said, but her words only served to confuse Sirius more.  
  
"What do you mean?" he asked in exasperation, the events of the day finally catching up with his tired mind 


	4. Be Honest With Yourself

Chapter 4-Be Honest with Yourself  
  
At his blank expression, she drew her wand and summoned a thick stack of parchment to herself and set it down on the table beside her so that the other two could see as well "Look here" she began as she pointed at a record on the first page "During Harry's first year, he was brought to the hospital wing at the end of the year after the incident with Quirrell, and he was barley alive, suffering from extreme shock after the effort it took to keep you-know-who from getting that stone. I had to cast many healing spells over him to stabilize him.  
  
During his second year, he was brought here again, but this time, it was for the bones in his arm to be re-grown and I found traces of that magic as well" here, she paused to take a deep breath as she sent a sideways glance to Sirius as she flipped to the next parchment in Harry's file "During his third year, Harry was brought here twice, first when he fell from his broom because of the Dementors and second when he had been surrounded by them in the forest, and again I found traces of the spells used both of those times as well.  
  
His fourth year, though, is where things begin to change, I saw Harry three times that year, the first was after his encounter with the dragon when it cut his shoulder and I found traces of the healing spell around the injury, and then, after the second task, I gave him a potion to warm him up and I found traces of that as well, but what confuses me is what happened after the third task. When the headmaster brought Harry here, I examined him and gave him a dreamless sleep potion, but I found no traces of it in his system at all. Furthermore, during his fifth year, he was injured by a plant in herbology, but I didn't have to use magic to heal his injuries, he insisted that they were only scratches so I just cleaned them and let them be, so the last time I had to heal him with magic was after the third task. You see those kind of spells leave a unique hint of magic behind for the rest of a persons life, and after Albus told me of his suspicions, I checked for the trace of these spells and found those I told you about, all of them up until after the third task." she finished with her brow furrowed in minor confusion.  
  
"Are you certain that all of these spells leave traces behind? It's been three years since you last saw Harry, the end of his sixth year, couldn't they have worn off or something?" asked Sirius, doubt evident in his voice.  
  
"No, Sirius, every spell a person has ever had cast on them leaves traces behind for the rest of that persons life, and nothing you do will remove those traces. They are very difficult to find, unless you know what you are looking for" she explained patiently as though she were speaking to a very small child.  
  
"So are you saying that this really could be Harry? And that ever since the third task an imposter has been here instead?" he asked, finally allowing some hope to shine through his pale eyes for the first time in too many years.  
  
"I'm not saying that, but there is a chance that that is the truth, but I'm not sure exactly how long ago they were switched, it could have been only a few months ago as far as I know" she answered with a shrug of her shoulders, but she couldn't hide the small smile on her face as she said her next words "I am sure, though, that this is a different person than you met during the attack"  
  
"How long until he awakens?" asked Dumbledore, speaking up for the first time in several minutes  
  
"Anywhere from several hours to days" she answered with a shrug of her shoulders "Until then, all we can do is wait" she added tiredly  
  
"Thank you, Poppy, why don't you go and get some rest" he said kindly to the matron  
  
"I would, Albus, but someone needs to be with him when he awakens and I honestly doubt you want to tell anyone else about him just yet" she said pointedly  
  
"True" he responded with a sigh as he glanced at the partially opened door at the other end of the ward, but an almost hesitant voice from his side brought him out of his silent thoughts.  
  
"I'll stay with him" the words startled him more than almost anything had ever startled him before and he turned to Sirius with wide, unbelieving eyes.  
  
"Sirius, are you sure?" he asked before he had a chance to think about his words  
  
"If he really is Harry and he has been kept as a prisoner for such a long time, I want to be there when he wakes up. I want to make sure it really is him" he said quietly as he turned his pain filled eyes onto his former headmaster "I want to make sure he's all right" he added in a voice barley above that of a whisper.  
  
"If you are certain that you are ready to do this, then it is fine by me" said the old man with a kind smile "Just let me know if anything changes, and be careful, as Poppy said, we aren't entirely sure when he was imprisoned, it could have been after he joined Voldemort, he may still be loyal to him, so keep your eyes opened" he ordered sternly  
  
"I will, sir. What are you going to tell the others?" he asked curiously  
  
"Just that we aren't sure about anything just yet and not to tell anyone else about what happened" he said and Sirius nodded in agreement  
  
"Good, it's settled then, I'll come in in a couple of hours to check on him, let me know if you need me before that" said Poppy as she turned and went into her office, no doubt to take a quick nap, and with a nod of parting, Dumbledore left as well and Sirius turned and began to walk to the room on the far end of the ward.  
  
His legs felt wooden and his feet like lead as he tried to approach the door, his heart beating wildly in his chest.  
  
'What am I doing!' he mind demanded fiercely and his steps faltered for a moment before another part of his mind responded  
  
'You're going to see Harry'  
  
'How do you know it's Harry and not some death eater trick?' demanded the first voice  
  
'Because, it just feels right, not like it felt when you were told Harry was a death eater' responded the logical part  
  
'But what if what I'm feeling is wrong?'  
  
'But what if its right?'  
  
And with that final thought resounding through his mind, he found his feet again and continued on his way to the door, pausing only long enough to push it open.  
  
When he stepped into the private room, his eyes traveled everywhere except to the bed. The window looked out onto the melting snow that was barely covering the grounds in preparation for spring, and despite the sun shinning brilliantly through the blue sky now, it was still cold outside. Not a single student was on the grounds, and Hagrid's hut, the quidditch pitch, and the greenhouses had been abandoned for several years now seeing as it was no longer safe for anyone to venture outside of the castle, not safe for student or professor. The castle was one of the few safe places left in the entire wizarding world today, and his heart nearly broke when he remembered the he had blamed his godson for this tragic turn of events.  
  
His eyes then traveled to the room itself, the walls were white and bare, but he had expected nothing else so he looked to the furnishings of the room. There were two chairs next to the bed, and laid across one were the cloths that whoever the boy was had been wearing and Sirius could not stop himself from approaching them. He pulled his own thick black cloak off the top and dropped it carelessly onto the immaculate floor before he picked up the tattered robes and looked onto the faded Hogwarts crest adorning them, the outline done in the familiar scarlet and gold of Gryffindor house, identical to that that had once been upon his own school robes, as he looked at it now, he was shocked that none of them had seen it at Azkaban. Further, he was startled that Poppy hadn't mentioned this, after all, it served to reinforce the fact that the Harry that they had come to fear was not the same boy who was lying before him. After starring at the dirty robes clutched in his trembling, white hands, he finally gathered up the courage to look to the bed.  
  
Laying on his back was a person who looked so familiar that Sirius felt his heart contract for a moment and his breath caught in his throat as he collapsed onto the chair and starred at the figure, his knuckles turning even whiter as he clutched the robes tighter.  
  
The person certainly looked like Harry, but not like the imposter had looked, quite far from it in fact. The imposter had short, spiked hair, and this boy's hair was long and quite matted looking, not unlike his own had looked after escaping Azkaban. The imposter had had a pale complexion, but his face was full and healthy looking, but the person he was looking at had a gaunt appearance and his complexion was so pale it was nearly white, leading him to believe that whoever this boy ended up being, even if it turned out not to be Harry, he had not been out of the darkness for quite sometime now. The imposter had been tall and fit looking, but again, this boy looked the total opposite, dangerously thin with absolutely no tone to his muscles, and he looked as though he were not any taller than the shortest firth year, maybe five foot three, maybe. But despite these things, he still looked like Harry.  
  
The famous lightning bolt scar was clearly visible on his forehead, and that jet black hair was unmistakable, as were the lines of the jaw and his other features, especially since the bruises had been healed along with the other cuts and abrasions that had been on his face and Sirius felt a smile tugging on his face with that thought until his eyes traveled down to the boys arms which were resting on top of the blankets. Both of them were covered with thick, painful looking scars, and he only hoped that Poppy would be able to remove them all with time. He felt terrible as he looked at them, terrible that his godson, for he was almost certain that he was indeed Harry now, had had to endure such terrible pains and no one had even noticed that he was gone, instead, they had been certain that he had turned against them and joined the path of the dark. Instead of trying to find and help his godson, Sirius had been intent on his death, and this caused such a deep regret that he was at a loss for how he would deal with it, or the consequences of his actions. 


	5. A Long Nights Work

Chapter 5  
  
When he left the hospital wing, Albus Dumbledore had been intent on going to his office, where undoubtedly he would meet those from Azkaban who were well enough to leave the makeshift hospital, but what he wasn't expecting was to end up with an armful of little girl as he rounded the last corner.  
  
"Jessica, come back here right now!" yelled the familiar voice of Remus Lupin and the headmaster couldn't suppress the small smile tugging at his lips.  
  
"Miss Rice, is it safe to assume that you have run away from Remus?" he asked in a kindly manner, and when she nodded her head, he continued "Why, might I ask?"  
  
"Because he won't let me go see that boy" she said in a small voice, sounding very much like the seven year old girl that they had found out she was  
  
"Oh, well, he has good reason to keep you from there right now, you see, the boy is very sick, and until he gets better, he isn't allowed to have visitors" said Dumbledore kindly  
  
"Oh, why did they hurt him? What did he do?" she asked with wide, curious blue eyes  
  
The headmaster sigh heavily, thinking of just how to explain the entire situation to the young child "He did nothing, Jessica, other than simply living, and those men who hurt him were very evil, very bad men. That is the only reason that they hurt him, and why they took your parents away from you" he said quietly, noticing the tears begin to well up in her eyes as Remus placed a hand on her small shoulder. He had come up just as she asked her question, and he had heard the answer and felt tears welling in his own eyes as well.  
  
"Is it true, then, Albus?" he whispered  
  
"We won't know for sure until he awakens, Remus, but I believe it is, and I think Sirius feels the same way, he is with him now in the hospital wing if you would like to join him, I will take care of Jessica for the time being" he said as he stood and with no more encouragement needed, the werewolf was walking quickly toward the hospital wing as he led Jessica toward his office.  
  
Once they had ascended the stone staircase and were safely in the confines of the headmasters office, the older man turned and smiled at the young girl beside him "So, what would you like to do while I speak to the other people who were rescued today?" he asked as he led her over toward the fire and directed her into one of the high backed armchairs.  
  
Jessica merely shrugged her shoulders as she looked around the room, silently surveying the strange things scattered throughout it "Well, why don't I go and find you something to color? How does that sound?" he asked with a hopeful voice and her expression brightened marginally for the first time since she had been told she couldn't go to the hospital wing and with another smile, Dumbledore turned and made his way over to the fireplace where he threw a pinch of powder into the flames "Virginia Weasley" he called into the now green flames, and a moment later, a young woman's head appeared in the middle of the fire.  
  
"Headmaster? Is everything all right?" she asked with her features drawn in a tense line  
  
"Fine, fine, and you? How are things in the nursery?" he asked  
  
"As well as could be expected, I guess, given the circumstances. Another village was attacked yesterday and we got six more children in who have no family left, and another eight that we are trying to find their relatives who are in hiding" she said with a heavy sigh, allowing her ever present weariness to shine through for a moment before she shook her head and focused her attention back on the wizard "Enough of that, what can I do for you, sir?" she asked  
  
"Well, I have some rather surprising news for you, actually. As you may remember from the last order meeting, it was discovered that Azkaban had been abandoned by the death eaters, and this morning, Remus and Sirius went to the island in search of any prisoners who might have been left behind" he began with a small twinkle in his eyes.  
  
Upon hearing his words, Ginny became extremely hopeful and her mind became entirely focused on his words "Did they find anyone?" she asked in a voice barely above a whisper. Since her induction into the Order of the Phoenix during her sixth year, the red head had become quite close to the deputy headmistress who had been her private tutor during her last two years at the school, and her capture had struck the young girl hard.  
  
"Yes Ginny, they found ten survivors, and before you ask, Minerva is fine" he said with a small smile and the girl let out the breath she didn't even know that she had been holding before a wide grin split her face as well.  
  
"Who else did they find?" she asked once the information had a chance to sink in a little  
  
"Fletcher was also found, as well as six captured aurors, and thankfully, none of them were to badly hurt and will be back to normal in a few days" he said before he turned his head and his eyes rested on the form of Jessica who had dozed off in her armchair after the eventful day she had had.  
  
"Who else, sir?" asked Ginny, pulling him from his thoughts of the young child  
  
"A seven year old girl named Jessica whose parents were killed in front of her" he said quietly, trying not to wake her "And a boy around nineteen years old who is unconscious in the hospital wing. He was the only one seriously hurt, in fact, he's lucky that he's alive" he said, more to himself than to the girl.  
  
"Well, I'll send someone down immediately to get Jessica. Who did you say the boy was? I could maybe start to look for his family" she said in a quiet voice as well.  
  
"We aren't sure who he is, but I am certain that you will probably not be able to find his family, they are all deceased, I'm almost certain of it, and as for Jessica, she is more than welcome to remain with me for the time being, seeing as you already have your hands full" he said, and Ginny smiled as well, seeing just how much he had already come to like the young child, and seeing this, she decided not to ask anything else about the boy.  
  
"Ok then, thank you sir, for telling me about Minerva, I really appreciate it. If there is nothing else, I had really better get finished here, Ron and Hermione are due back today and I was hoping to meet them for dinner in the great hall" she said  
  
"Of course, have a nice evening, and could you please tell Ron and Hermione to be expecting to hear from me within the next week, I believe I will need to speak to all three of you shortly. Oh, and could you please send some things down here for Jessica, a few clean robes and some toys?" he asked as an afterthought  
  
"Sure, I'll see you later" said Ginny, knowing it was pointless to even ask what he was going to want to speak about until it was time, and with that, her head was gone from the fire and Albus settled behind his desk.  
  
The next hour, the headmaster of Hogwarts passed the time by answering owls from various order members concerning their current assignments, but his mind kept wandering to the hospital wing and the newest occupant of the castle. How is it possible that Harry Potter was back? How long exactly had it been that they were believing the imposter to be Harry? Furthermore, how long had the boy in the hospital wing been kept in the prison? But perhaps, the most important question of all was the one that he didn't want to think about. How, in Merlin's name, were they going to explain to the child that they had thought him to be evil, that they didn't even know that he was in need of help, that they couldn't even tell that it wasn't even him who had been performing such appalling things against the wizarding and muggle worlds alike? He was worried about these things, despite what he had told Sirius, because, like the ex-convict, he knew in his heart that this really was Harry and that he had been an innocent all along, held in a prison and completely unaware of what was happening in the world, what he was being blamed for.  
  
A sudden knock on his office door drew him out of his thoughts and after casting a quick glance at the still sleeping child on the couch, he called for the visitor to enter "Ah, Severus, to what do I owe this pleasure?" he asked with a forced smile on his face  
  
"Headmaster" he said in greeting before taking a seat in a chair across from the old man, but before he could say another word, his eyes caught sight of the small brown haired girl lying on the couch, and for one of the few times in his life, he was struck speechless, but only for a moment "Who is that, Albus?" he asked, knowing that the older man knew of whom he was speaking.  
  
"Her name is Jessica Rice, Remus and Sirius found her in Azkaban. Her parents were killed by death eaters and they planned on raising her as one of their own, but apparently she was forgotten when they abandoned the prison" he explained to the potions master, who's eyes were riveted on the child until he heard where she had been found and his gaze whipped around to the headmaster again.  
  
"She was found in Azkaban? They made it? Did they find anyone else?" he asked in rapid succession  
  
"Yes, several aurors, Minerva, Fletcher, and a teenage boy that we haven't been able to make a positive identity of" he answered  
  
"Are they ok?' he asked, unconsciously holding his breath as he awaited an answer, and he released it when he saw a small smile grace the others lips  
  
"Yes, for the most part, they are fine, all but the boy are being treated in the third floor by the relief doctors" he said distractedly, forgetting for a moment his promise to himself not to mention the child to anyone who didn't already know.  
  
"Where is he being treated?" asked the potions master immediately  
  
"Huh? Oh, the boy, he's currently being cared for by Poppy" he answered hesitantly, praying that the subject would now be dropped, but his was disappointed that it wasn't.  
  
"Why is that? I thought she was only treating students and overflow patients" said Snape with his brow furrowed  
  
"Well, we decided it would be in the boy's best interest if he were to remain in the hospital wing, away from prying eyes, until we have discovered the entire story" said the old man heavily, and before Snape could respond, he spoke again "Severus, that is enough for now, please, be prepared to attend an order meeting within the next few nights, there is an issue that will need to be discussed, but right now, I must be getting Jessica settled in her room, it's getting late" he said, dismissing the other man as he stood, and reluctantly, Snape stood as well and retreated from the office as Dumbledore gathered Jessica in his arms and went through a hidden door into a small bedroom. He gently laid the girl upon the bed and with a wave of his wand, transfigured her dirty robes into clean pajamas. He then covered her with the thick blankets and with a whispered goodnight, went through another door into his own bedroom. 


	6. Awakenings

Chapter 6  
  
While the conversation between Dumbledore and Ginny was taking place, Remus Lupin had just arrived at the hospital wing and located the room that his best friend was sitting next to the spitting image of Harry Potter. Cautiously, he approached the chair Sirius was sitting in and laid his hand on his shoulder, never taking his eyes off the black haired boy.  
  
Startled by the contact, Sirius turned around and saw Remus and he felt a small smile tug the sides of his lips "Moony, I really think it might be him" he whispered quietly  
  
"As do I, Padfoot" he answered without looking at the man "When does Poppy think he will wake up?" he asked after several minutes of silence had passed between the pair.  
  
"Anywhere from hours to days from now, she's not sure" answered Sirius as he continued his unwavering vigil of the boy who looked like his godson  
  
Remus nodded even though Sirius couldn't see him and sat in the chair on the opposite side of the bed. They remained unspeaking until the sun began to peak over the horizon, several hours later, and finally, Remus broke the quite with a question that had been nagging at him since he had heard that Albus believed that this really was Harry.  
  
"How long was he there?" he asked almost hesitantly  
  
"We're not sure, Albus said we wouldn't know until he woke up" answered Sirius without changing his focus  
  
"However long it was, I hope it wasn't too long" muttered Remus to himself, but unfortunately, he was overheard  
  
"God, why didn't I realize that it wasn't him doing all of those things? I claimed to be his friend, his family, I should have known better, I should have been able to tell it wasn't him. He shouldn't have hade to be there for any length of time at all. But I didn't even try to figure it out, I just assumed that he had gone over to you-know-who" he said in a self- berating tone as his gaze shifted to the floor.  
  
"Padfoot, don't blame yourself, we're all at fault here and there is nothing we can do about it until he wakes up and we can find out exactly what happened" he said quietly "All we can do now is be here for him when he does wake, and then apologize and hope he forgives us" he said quietly and the pair once again fell into silence.  
  
For the next three weeks, Remus and Sirius remained at their self appointed posts beside the hospital bed, leaving the person occupying it only when they were forced to attend the meeting of the inner circle of the Order twice a week. So far, no one else knew about the suspicions surrounding the new arrival, or the small truths that had been discovered yet, and the three men who did know kept quiet about it. Jessica had settled in with the headmaster and was often seen accompanying him everywhere he went, from meals in the great hall to his own visits to the hospital wing, and she was quickly warming up to the old man, and had even been heard calling him grandpa Albus by McGonagall one morning.  
  
Ron and Hermione had arrived at the castle on two separate occasions while they were between missions and had been present at the meetings while they were there, and it pained Remus and Sirius to no end that they couldn't tell them of their discovery yet.  
  
The past five years had been extremely difficult for the two, though they were reluctant to discuss it with anyone other than each other, and the stress was clearly evident on both of their faces. Their complexions were both pale and drawn, and despite the efforts of all of their friends, they would rarely smile about anything at all anymore. Hermione's parents had been killed in a death eater attack just weeks after her graduation, as had all four of Ron's grandparents and his brothers Charlie and Percy who had both been at the ministry when it was finally overtaken. The rest of the Weasley's were at the castle, doing their respective part for the order, whether it was planning, fighting, teaching those students still attending the school, or in Ginny and Molly's case, caring for the growing number of orphaned children. Fred and George had put their hopes of opening up a joke shop on hold indefinitely, partly due to the fact that they were needed for more important matters, and partly because they had thrown the gold Harry had given them into the lake when they found out that he had become a death eater.  
  
On that particular night, exactly three weeks after the raid on Azkaban, the seven remaining Weasley's, Hermione, Remus, Sirius, the entire teaching staff of Hogwarts, about three dozen aurors, and another nearly two hundred other order members had congregated in the great hall for one of the monthly meetings of all order members who were not currently on assignment. The four house tables had been set into a large square and the group had all wearily taken their seats, all looking tired and frustrated, and all looking decidedly worse for the wear given what they had been through in the past years. In fact, many of those present were themselves children, the most recent graduates of Hogwarts, and as he surveyed the crowd, Dumbledore felt a pang of regret that they were here worried about their future and being forced to fight for their lives when the oldest of them, including Ron and Hermione, were only nineteen, the youngest, seventeen, having just finished school only months before, yet all had the appearance of battle hardened adults, their eyes set and determined.  
  
At eleven o'clock on the dot, Dumbledore rose from his seat and the quiet whispering had died down immediately as the nearly three hundred eyes all turned to him, awaiting his orders.  
  
"Good evening, it is wonderful to see so that many of you have made it here tonight" he began with a rather forced smile as his eyes unconsciously traveled to the corner of the room where Jessica was sitting and reading intently, and feeling his eyes upon her, she looked up and flashed him a bright smile which he returned before continuing with his opening speech "I know that many of you are anxious to get some sleep, so I will make this meeting as quick as possible before your respective group leaders assign you with your next task and receive your reports from your last one. But I'm afraid we have some other business to take care of first. As you may remember from our last meeting, we had received information that the prison of Azkaban had been abandoned upon the death of Harry Potter" he said, though it pained him to be forced to remind them of the young boy, undoubtedly only adding to their resentment of him "Acting on this information, a small group of order members went to the fortress and found the rumors to be true, and they were able to retrieve a total of ten prisoners of Voldemort's, but sadly, another sixteen were not so lucky, thirteen of which were order members who had been captured within the past months" he said heavily before he continued "But thankfully, among those rescued were eight order members, all of whom are present tonight" he said with a small smile as he caught each person's eyes in turn. During his lapse into silence, Arthur Weasley addressed the old man.  
  
"If I may ask, sir, who were the other two survivors? Is it possible that they could join as well? Perhaps they could be a valuable asset to our cause, they may know of some of the death eaters plans" he said thoughtfully, causing Remus and Sirius to turn their heads quickly to the headmaster, wondering how he would answer this delicate question without arousing any suspicions.  
  
"Alas, I'm afraid that that would be impossible, Arthur, for they are both mere children. One of those who was found is young Jessica Rice whose parents fell to the death eaters" he said as he nodded his head to the young girl who was absorbed in her book "And the other is a boy, no more than nineteen whom we can't identify and hasn't awaken since his arrival" he said sadly, and with those words, the others knew that that discussion had been closed. The rest of the meeting continued with reports being given by each of the group leaders and concluded some two hours later with each member being assigned to a new mission before they all wearily retreated to their beds, in various unused areas of the enormous castle. Remus and Sirius left immediately for the hospital wing and Dumbledore gathered Jessica's sleeping form and followed them moments later in the direction of his own quarters.  
  
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~  
  
Just as the afore mentioned meeting was drawing to a close, the 'unidentified' youth in the hospital wing was beginning to awaken.  
  
The first thing that he noticed was that he was somewhere warm, somewhere comfortable, and somewhere noisy. Albeit, most would call the hospital wing of Hogwarts unbearably silent at nearly one o'clock on a Thursday morning, but to one who had spent who knows how long imprisoned in a hidden cell deep within the bowls of Azkaban prison, with only his own thoughts to keep him company when he wasn't being tortured by faceless enemies, it was a roaring cacophony of sound. He heard the portraits lining the walls snoring lightly in their sleep, heard the ghosts gliding through the walls many floors above and below him, heard the hooting of owls and howling of other creatures in the forbidden forest, heard the wind whispering as it blew past the ancient stone walls, heard the fire crackling within the matrons office, heard the gentle footsteps of the night patrol groups, both inside the castle and the death eaters walking around outside, hidden in the shadows. All of these sounds were ringing in his ears, and he couldn't distinguish one from the other, let alone deduce where he was, but he knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that he was no longer at the prison, and the feeling of security and relative well being led him to believe that he was no longer among the death eaters either.  
  
The next thing he became aware of was that the pain was gone, well most of it anyway. Sure, his muscles still ached, and his joints made him feel as though he were at least three times his real age, but when compared to how he had been accustomed to feeling for longer than he could remember, he felt one hundred percent better. With his eyes still closed, his hands sought out anything they could feel, and he was disappointed to find that both arms felt far to heavy, making it only possible for him to move thin a few inches each before his weak muscles were trembling, but what he felt in those few inches served to reaffirm his suspicions that he was no longer a prisoner, for why would the death eaters cover him with soft and thick blankets?  
  
Before he had a chance to answer that question, he heard the too loud sound of someone opening a door and striding in his direction. Instinctively, he froze, holding his breath and awaiting the strike that he knew was coming, and he wasn't disappointed, for a moment later, he felt a large and rough hand ghost over his forehead, and he immediately winced away from the contact, turning his face as far as it would go in the opposite direction and clenching his fists as tight as possible as he felt himself begin to tremble in fear and apprehension. He squeezed his eyes tighter shut and willed himself not to cry out as he felt the hand jerk back and heard a startled gasp, but any words were drowned out by his own breathing that had become ragged with fear.  
  
Several minutes passed like this, before he felt another hand on his face, forcing his mouth open, and too weak to protest, he was made to comply and an instant later, he felt some sort of cool liquid trickling down his throat and he felt himself unwillingly relaxing back into the soft bed.  
  
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~  
  
As soon as the meeting ended, Sirius went immediately up to the hospital wing while Remus went to go take a quick shower. He was frustrated and annoyed at how long the meeting had taken and how little they seemed to have accomplished. During the last month alone, they had lost fifty order members, plus the thirteen that they had found in Azkaban, and they were still no closer to defeating Voldemort than they were when he first was reborn. As much as he hated to admit it, they were loosing, and he could see no way of turning things to their favor, there were just too many people supporting Voldemort now, far too many. Sighing heavily, he pushed the hospital wing door opened and stalked across the floor to the furthest bed. Upon seeing the face of his godson, for he was now positively convinced, he relaxed a great deal and gently went to stroke his forehead when the most shocking and astonishing thing happened, Harry moved. True, it wasn't a move that would have reassured Sirius in the slightest that Harry would be ok, but it was a move nonetheless, and that was more than had happened in the past three weeks combined.  
  
Harry almost violently turned his face from his godfathers concerned hand and Sirius saw him clench both his eyes and his hands before he began to shake uncontrollably upon the bed. Startled, he withdrew his hand immediately and looked at the boy in shock before he returned to his senses and began to try and calm him down.  
  
"Shh, Harry, it's just me, Sirius, it's all right, just breath, calm down, shh" he repeated over and over again, but it wasn't working and Harry's breathing had begun to go ragged and Sirius immediately called out for the matron "Poppy! Come quick!" he yelled almost frantically over his shoulder.  
  
An instant later, the woman had come bustling in and when she saw what was happening, he eyes bulged and she stood frozen on the spot until Sirius' sharp words made her focus "Help him!" he cried frantically and she immediately ran to her office and returned a moment later with a strong calming potion which she forced into the boy's mouth as gently as she could and almost instantly, he began to relax.  
  
Sirius cautiously approached the bedside and took one of the sweaty hands in his own, and thankfully, this time, he received no ill response, instead, Harry weakly squeezed his hand "Harry, can you hear me? It's Sirius" he said gently, and almost withdrew his hand when the boy winced at the sound of his voice. Worriedly, he looked to the mediwitch for an answer.  
  
"Whisper, his ears are probably overly sensitive after spending so much time in the prison" she said quietly, and nodding he turned back to Harry who was struggling to open his eyes.  
  
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~* 


	7. Awakenings 2The Truth

Chapter 7-Awaking the Truth  
  
Once he had felt himself beginning to relax, Harry was able to focus on the words that were being spoken very close to him, and for the first time in longer than he could remember, there was no evil or hate passed through the voice, instead, he couldn't place just what the emotion was that he was hearing, or who the voice belonged to for that matter. Concentrating every ounce of energy he possessed on deciphering just what the words he was hearing meant, but try as he might, he couldn't distinguish anything except for the tone of the words, and due to this, he tried even harder to fully awaken, for he realized that it was concern that laced that still unidentified voice.  
  
Putting forth a final burst of strength, he was just able to pry his eyes opened, and the images that flooded his brain made him wish that he hadn't. Even though it was the middle of the night, and therefore completely dark outside the building he was in, that particular room was blazing with light given off by the blurry forms of the torches that were lining the walls, one directly above the bed he was lying on. The second thing that made him regret his decision, and perhaps the worst of the two, was the fact that despite the bright light he was seeing, he was only seeing it on the left side of his body, everything on the right was still shrouded in complete darkness. Moaning softly, he turned his face toward the sound of the voice which was still persistently speaking from his right side so that he could properly see the person addressing him.  
  
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~  
  
After several minutes of gentle coaxing, Sirius was relieved to see the boy's eyes forced open, but his relief only lasted an instant. The child's right eye, the only one he could see from his position at the bedside, was a murky, milky white color, and the sight of it rendered him speechless for a moment before a nudge in his back by the mediwitch urged him to continue speaking.  
  
"Harry, can you hear me? Let me know if you know what I'm saying" he said softly and thankfully, with a soft moan, the boy's head turned to him and fixed him with an emerald gaze, but what Sirius saw in that gaze drained all relief from him, and judging by the gasp from behind him, Poppy was affected as well.  
  
The gaze that had used to hold suck a bright spark of life, always strong and ready for anything, was dull, almost lifeless, much as that of the imposters had been. In the instant that he saw that defeated look in the teens fixed gaze, Sirius knew that the road in front of him was going to be long and painful, and he swore to himself right then that he wouldn't be traveling it alone, never again, but a spark of hope was ignited in his heart when he heard his godson's voice speaking to him, a voice he had never admitted that he had missed desperately.  
  
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*  
  
Once he had caught sight of the person next to him, a flood of memories assailed Harry's brain. Event though the image was slightly blurry due to his lack of glasses, he knew that the man was familiar, and images began to play across his thoughts, a bedraggled shack covered in dust with a gaunt and haggard man sitting on a shredded bed, pleading for the truth to be understood; a great black dog chasing after the distant form of a gray wolf during a full moon; the same haggard man unconscious on the floor of a forest while floating black shapes surrounded him; a black haired man flying off into the moonlight astride a giant creature, half horse and half bird; a dark cave littered with rat bones; all of these images brought forth the same feeling as the words that were being spoken now, concern, and love, from this man to him. Suddenly, the pictures ended and left Harry with the thought 'Sirius.Padfoot.Snuffles.Godfather, it's him, he's here, I know him! It's Sirius' he thought triumphantly and despite the rawness of his throat and the stiffness of his muscles, he felt his lips turn upwards ever so slightly before he managed to choke out a mere three words, three words that brought tears to his godfathers eyes "Sirius, you came" and with that, he felt consciousness leaving him once again as exhaustion overtook him.  
  
Once they were certain that he was asleep again, Sirius and the mediwitch moved a few meters from the bed and began a hushed conversation.  
  
"Will he be ok?" asked the man immediately, almost afraid of the answer that he would receive.  
  
"Physically, I think he will be fine in time. I should be able to heal most, of his scars, but you need to remember that he has been through a lot. It will take quite a bit of time for him to recover his strength. I doubt that I will be able to heal his vision in the injured eye though, it has been too long" she said with regret, and hearing this, Sirius nodded in understanding, and when the woman didn't continue on her own, he prompted her for the answer to the question he was most worried about.  
  
"What about mentally? Will he ever be the same?" he asked quietly as his eyes sought out the sleeping boy  
  
"I don't know" she answered honestly "You saw his reaction just like I did. We have no idea just what he's gone through, and until he's ready to tell us, there is nothing we can do to help him, if we can at all" she said as her eyes too traveled to the figure on the bed.  
  
"How can I tell him the truth about what happened?" asked Sirius after several minutes of silence, and upon seeing the bewildered look of the healer, he elaborated "How do I tell him that we thought he had changed sides? That we never even knew he was missing?" but he wasn't surprised when he received no answer, for there was none.  
  
Twenty minutes later, the hospital wing door opened and Albus Dumbledore and Remus Lupin entered. Upon seeing them, Poppy informed them about the change in his condition, so it was with smiles on their faces that they joined Sirius beside the bed.  
  
"Padfoot, Poppy told us the news, it's great!" said Remus enthusiastically as he placed a hand on his friends shoulder  
  
"Yes, this is indeed very good news" added the headmaster, and if one were to look closely enough, they would notice that his eyes held a slight twinkle, the likes of which had not been seen for many years from the old man.  
  
Sirius mutely nodded in agreement as he felt his own smile pass across his features for a fleeting moment before his mind turned back to the conversation he had had with the mediwitch earlier in the evening and the smile fell off his face once again.  
  
"Sirius, what's wrong? I thought you would be thrilled" said Remus when he noticed his friends expression  
  
"Don't get me wrong, I couldn't be happier that Harry is getting better" he said quickly  
  
"So what's the problem then?" asked the werewolf  
  
"I just hope he'll be all right after everything that has happened" he answered quietly, and behind his back, the headmaster and Remus met each others eyes and both instantly knew what the real problem was and their good moods dissipated as well and they sat heavily in the other two chairs.  
  
The three men were silent for nearly three hours, each lost in their own thoughts. As the sun began to rise over the distant mountains and forest, Albus stood and moved to stand beside the bed, aware of the two men watching him curiously.  
  
He silently watched the boy's sleep, and a few minutes later, he was joined by Sirius and Remus.  
  
"What are you doing?" asked Sirius quietly after waiting for the man to speak on his own  
  
"He's having a vision" said Dumbledore bluntly, and the others dropped their jaws as their eyes went wide and they looked to Harry in alarm.  
  
As far as they could tell, Harry was just sleeping, albeit a little restlessly. His brow was furrowed ever so slightly, and his forehead had a very faint layer of sweat visible on the pale skin, and his hands were twitching minutely, but other than these things, he looked just the same as he had for the past weeks.  
  
"What makes you think that, sir?" asked Remus, truly confused, but before he got an answer, something else changed, but this change was much more apparent. Harry's scar had begun to bleed. Not a lot of blood, just enough to cover the old injury, and when they saw this, Sirius reached out to wake him up, but his hand was stilled before he touched the boy.  
  
"No, if you wake him, the vision will not be complete, and we have no idea what would happen because of it" said the headmaster quietly without taking his eyes from the child.  
  
After another couple of minutes, the vision appeared to have ended as Harry weakly opened his eyes. Blinking rapidly several times in the now bright sunlight coming from outside, he was finally able to tell that there were three people standing over him. His breath immediately hitched in his throat and he felt his muscles tense involuntarily, especially when one of the people standing over him leaned closer. But despite his greatest efforts, he was unable to move away from the figures, so he clenched his eyes shut and waited for the curse or blow, whichever came first, but much to his astonishment, neither came. Instead, he felt cold metal touching his face, and after nothing painful happened, he chanced opening his eyes again, and much to his amazement, the surroundings were in focus thanks to the glasses he now wore, and after tentatively looking to his right, he was relieved that the three men standing over him didn't have their wands drawn, and none of them were wearing masks, instead, all three looked concerned.  
  
"Harry?" asked one of them, a man with long white hair and a full beard  
  
It took a minute, but he finally realized that they were speaking to him, he was Harry, and once this realization struck him, he nodded his head ever so slightly and all three men smiled widely.  
  
"Oh, Merlin, it's so good to see you awake!" exclaimed a man with brown hair with streaks of gray and golden eyes "How are you feeling?" he asked as the smile began to diminish from his face to be replaced by a look of concern  
  
Again, Harry nodded without saying a word and slowly moved his head so that he caught the eyes of his godfather. He was very thirsty, and even though the other two men were very familiar to him, he couldn't place them right then, so he decided to make his requests to his godfather. "Thirsty" he finally managed to whisper and instantly, Sirius leaned over and grabbed a glass of water from the bedside table. He gently sat on the edge of the bed and slid an arm behind his godson's shoulders to help him sit up before lifting the glass to his lips, knowing the other was to weak to hold it himself. After a few small swallows, he removed the glass and replaced his arm with several pillows just as Poppy entered joined the group.  
  
"Good, you're awake" she said happily as she began to make a quick examination. While she was working, the headmaster walked closer to the bed and looked thoughtfully down on the young ward, apparently thinking of something before he broke the silence.  
  
"Poppy, could you please give our young friend here an energy boosting potion?" and at her outraged look, he elaborated "I'm afraid there are several questions that need to be answered as soon as possible, time is of the essence" he finished  
  
"Sir, this boy has been through a lot, and he just awoke a few hours ago. What he needs now is rest, not an interrogation" she said brazenly, and then she seemed to realize just who she was speaking too, and her face flushed in embarrassment  
  
"I understand your concerns, Poppy, but this is of utmost importance" he said in a commanding tone, and she obediently nodded her head and left to retrieve the requested potion.  
  
During the entire exchange, Sirius had remained seated with Harry on the bed, and upon hearing the request of the headmaster, he felt the boy tense, and looking down in concern, he saw that his eyes were focused straight ahead, a look of dread etched onto his features. Before Sirius could say anything, though, Pomfrey had returned and approached the bed.  
  
She reached the vile toward Harry's mouth, but the boy quickly buried his head in Sirius' robes, his frail form now trembling.  
  
"Let me" said Sirius quietly, and Poppy handed him the purple potion before leaving to return to her office, clearly not happy about what was about to happen to her patient "Harry" Sirius said quietly, and a moment later, he was met with a steady gaze, one eye emerald green, the other milky white "Harry, I need you to drink this. Don't worry, we're just going to try and figure out what happened, and maybe answer some of your questions too" he said in a reassuring tone, and after several minutes of thought, Harry finally agreed by nodding his head. Again, Sirius helped him to swallow the goblet, and after a few moments of waiting, his eyes became more focused and it felt as though his mind was finally up to speed with the surrounding world.  
  
"Do you feel better?" asked Dumbledore calmly as he again took his seat next to the bed  
  
"Yes, sir" said Harry, his voice still soft, but strong now  
  
"Good, now I am going to ask you a few questions, and I would like you to answer them as honestly and completely as you can, ok?"  
  
"Yes sir" repeated Harry  
  
"Very good, now what is your name?"  
  
"Harry Potter" he responded quickly  
  
"Ok, Harry, why were you in the fortress of Azkaban?"  
  
"Because Voldemort sent me there" he answered  
  
"Why?"  
  
"Because the Riddle house had been taken by the ministry"  
  
"Did he get angry with you when they took his family home?"  
  
"What do you mean, sir?"  
  
"Is that why he sent you to the prison? Because you allowed his home to be taken?"  
  
"No, he sent me to Azkaban because it was the only other place he could send me where I wouldn't be found" said Harry, slight confusion evident on his features  
  
"Who was he hiding you from?" asked Albus  
  
"The ministry, the order, all but the most loyal death eaters, everyone"  
  
"Where were you kept while you were at the Riddle house?"  
  
"In the basement, in a small closet, bound and gagged so no one would know I was there" he answered in an expressionless tone, completely oblivious to the tension that was building in the room.  
  
"What did he do to you there?"  
  
"Cursed me, beat me, everything" he whispered  
  
"How long were you at the mansion before you were moved to Azkaban?"  
  
"I don't know"  
  
"How long were you in Azkaban?"  
  
"I don't know" he repeated  
  
"When were you taken to the Riddle House?"  
  
"Right after the third task" he responded, deaf to the gasps that were uttered by the three men  
  
"What happened the night of the third task, Harry?"  
  
"After Cedric and I touched the cup, we were taken to a grave yard, Wormtail killed Cedric and tied me to a tombstone. He made a potion and Voldemort was reborn. I dueled with him, and then my wand did something strange, I ran and was about to grab the cup again, I was only a step from it with Cedric, and I was hit with a cruciatus curse. I guess I blacked out because when I woke up, I was tied in the basement"  
  
"What happened after that?"  
  
"They would come down every couple of hours it seemed, and wither beat me or curse me, and every so often, they would force me to drink a potion, I think they said it was a nutrition potion so that I couldn't die, they said I had to stay alive for some reason. I don't know when, but quite a while after I was taken there, I heard shouting coming from inside the house, and loud bangs and thumping from upstairs. Someone ran through the basement and I heard them say that the ministry and order were attacking. I tried to yell, but no one heard me, I was too weak. A couple of minutes later, Voldemort came down and cast the cruciatus on me again until I passed out, and when I woke up, I was in a hidden cell in Azkaban. It was pretty much the same thing there, but this time, when no death eaters were around, there were four dementors standing guard over me. I don't know how long I was there, but one day, I woke up and everyone was gone, it was completely silent except for the house elf that would bring the potion every couple of days until he too was gone one day and I saw no one or heard anything. I guess it was only a couple of days later when I woke up and saw Sirius and Remus there, and you know the rest" he finished in a voice just a quiet as the rest of his tale had been  
  
"What about the visions, how long have you been having them?"  
  
"The entire time" he answered bluntly  
  
"Thank you for your honesty, now I guess we could probably answer some questions for you" said the old man after several silent minutes  
  
"What's been happening while I've been gone? I know about everything Voldemort's side has done, but I only see things through his eyes, not what is happening in the rest of the world"  
  
"Well, to put it bluntly, we are at war, a war that I am afraid we are slowly loosing unless something changes things to our side fast" answered the old man heavily  
  
"How many people have died?" he asked hesitantly  
  
"Too many, Percy and Charlie Weasley, the Dursley's, Minister Fudge, and more than I can recall right now"  
  
"What about Ron and Hermione?" he asked, scared of the answer he would receive  
  
"Both are still fighting, both members of the order and very accomplished aurors now" he answered proudly, but his pride diminished when he saw the pained look on Harry's face "What's wrong?"  
  
"They really think it was me, don't they. They don't know it was someone else with my face" he said quietly, and the three men looked to one another in shock before Sirius answered  
  
"They thought it was you, but now that we know the truth, they'll be here as soon as they can, happy that it wasn't" he said gently, but another look of confusion had become fixed to the boy's face.  
  
"You said they were aurors and order members?" he asked the headmaster  
  
"Yes" he answered quietly  
  
"How? Did they leave school early?" he asked in confusion  
  
"No, Harry, they graduated" he answered  
  
"How long was I gone?" he demanded after this thought had had a chance to sink in "I thought it had been a year, perhaps two at the most, but I still had three years of school left when I was captured and you said Ron and Hermione have graduated, how long was I gone!?" he demanded almost frantically, his hands shaking again  
  
"A little over five years, Harry, you are nineteen now. You were kept at the Riddle house for a year and a half and in Azkaban for four years" he almost whispered  
  
"F.fi.five years" he stuttered out, his eyes pained and looking at the wall "It took you five years to realize it was someone else trying to impersonate me?" he asked in disbelief  
  
"I am so sorry, Harry, but we didn't know" said Sirius as he tried to pull his godson in a hug  
  
"NO, Get off of me, leave me ALONE! My own family, and best friends couldn't tell that it was some death eater who came back from that graveyard and not me!" he yelled almost frantically "Leave me alone! All of you! You should have just left me there if this is what you were going to tell me as soon as I got back! Sorry, Harry, we thought you had become Voldemort's murdering right hand man, we actually thought you would do that! Well, I don't accept your apologies! You should have known better! You should have known me better! You shouldn't have left me there for five years!" he yelled, bordering on hysterical now as his entire body shook with rage until the headmaster pulled his wand and cast a strong sleeping spell on him, causing his form to drop back to the bed and his breathing to even out ever so slowly.  
  
"I had to do it, he would have caused himself more harm if he continued in that manner" he said quietly  
  
"He's right, you know, we should have known" said Sirius as he buried his face in his hands, and just as Remus was about to comfort his best friend, a voice from behind him stopped him.  
  
"Bloody hell, what is he doing here!" and as one, the three men turned around to see a furious Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger and a shocked Ginny Weasley standing just inside the curtained off area, all looking in shock to the now sleeping form on the bed. 


	8. Friendship Tested

Chapter 8-Friendship Tested  
  
Ron and Hermione had spent the night in Ginny's quarters in the makeshift orphanage the night before, and upon waking this morning, had realized that one of the young children had fallen out of bed the night before and broke her arm, not an uncommon injury when six year olds were sleeping on bunk beds. Ginny had broken the news that she wouldn't be able to join the others for breakfast, but they had insisted on accompanying her and Ashleigh to the infirmary, saying they could just go down to the kitchen afterward together to catch up. When they entered the ward, though, they were met with the strangest sight. The very last bed had been completely blocked from view by the white curtains, not uncommon in itself, but they could clearly recognize the silhouette of the headmaster and Remus Lupin sitting in chairs beside a bed upon which Sirius Black sat next to someone they couldn't recognize on shadow alone.  
  
Ron turned to Hermione with his brow furrowed in confusion, asking a silent question of who else was being treated in the hospital wing, and how that person would be in the company of three of the orders leaders, and after a moment of though, her eyes lit up with comprehension and she leaned over to whisper to the two red heads "It's the boy they found in Azkaban" she said excitedly and as one, the trio began to creep toward the curtains, and when they were only a meter from it, they were able to hear the conversation clearly, so they stood silently and listened, all curious as to why this boy seemed so important to the three men.  
  
"What about the visions, how long have you been having them?" asked the voice of the headmaster, sounding sad and old for the first time any of them had ever heard  
  
"The entire time" answered a quiet, almost inaudible voice of a teenage boy  
  
"Thank you for your honesty, now I guess we could probably answer some questions for you" said the old man after several silent minutes  
  
"What's been happening while I've been gone? I know about everything Voldemort's side has done, but I only see things through his eyes, not what is happening in the rest of the world" and when they heard the words, the three eavesdroppers turned to one another in utter shock until Dumbledore answered  
  
"Well, to put it bluntly, we are at war, a war that I am afraid we are slowly loosing unless something changes things to our side fast" answered the old man heavily and for the first time, the three realized just how bad things were getting  
  
"How many people have died?" asked the boy's voice, almost hesitantly  
  
"Too many, Percy and Charlie Weasley, the Dursley's, Minister Fudge, and more than I can recall right now" and the three all felt a pang of sadness upon hearing the names of the fallen Weasley's, so profound that they didn't pay attention to the other names spoken  
  
"What about Ron and Hermione?" asked the boy and the two mentioned people felt their eyes grow wide as they looked to one another in shock again. Who was this person? Did they know him? How did he know them? Was he an old classmate or something?  
  
"Both are still fighting, both members of the order and very accomplished aurors now" answered the headmaster and they were once again shocked, who was this that he would openly speak of the order to them "What's wrong?" asked the old man suddenly, drawing the conversation back to their attention  
  
"They really think it was me, don't they. They don't know it was someone else with my face" asked the boy in an even more soft voice and they didn't understand who he was talking about now, surely not them anymore. On second thought, what was he talking about exactly?  
  
"They thought it was you, but now that we know the truth, they'll be here as soon as they can, happy that it wasn't" said Sirius' voice, almost just as quietly  
  
"You said they were aurors and order members?" the boy asked suddenly, and they realized that he was indeed talking of themselves  
  
"Yes" he answered quietly  
  
"How? Did they leave school early?" he asked in confusion  
  
"No, Harry, they graduated" he answered and the sound of that name caused them all to freeze in shock. Harry? Harry? No, it couldn't be, Harry was a traitor, a death eater, Voldemort's heir, and most of all, Harry was dead, DEAD! So, who was in the hospital wing pretending to be their former best friend? They asked themselves these questions in rapid succession, but Ginny had elected to continue paying attention to the conversation, unlike Ron and Hermione who had completely tuned it out.  
  
"How long was I gone?" the boy, Harry, demanded harshly "I thought it had been a year, perhaps two at the most, but I still had three years of school left when I was captured and you said Ron and Hermione have graduated, how long was I gone!?" he demanded his voice becoming frantic  
  
"A little over five years, Harry, you are nineteen now. You were kept at the Riddle house for a year and a half and in Azkaban for four years" the headmaster almost whispered, and Ginny felt her heart contract violently. If they were speaking the truth...oh Merlin, what had they done! Before she could think or do anything else, he was speaking again.  
  
"F.fi.five years" he stuttered out, his voice full of pain "It took you five years to realize it was someone else trying to impersonate me?" he asked in disbelief  
  
"I am so sorry, Harry, but we didn't know" said Sirius sounding like he was about to break down himself  
  
"NO, Get off of me, leave me ALONE! My own family, and best friends couldn't tell that it was some death eater who came back from that graveyard and not me!" he yelled almost frantically "Leave me alone! All of you! You should have just left me there if this is what you were going to tell me as soon as I got back! 'Sorry, Harry, we thought you had become Voldemort's murdering right hand man, we actually thought you would do that!' Well, I don't accept your apologies! You should have known better! You should have known me better! You shouldn't have left me there for five years!" he yelled hysterically, but an instant later, there was a soft thud and Ginny knew he had either been stunned or put into a magical sleep  
  
"I had to do it, he would have caused himself more harm if he continued in that manner" the headmaster said quietly.  
  
Just then, Ron and Hermione had begun to move toward the screens, and still in shock herself, Ginny mutely followed behind them.  
  
"He's right, you know, we should have known" said Sirius, but before anything else could be said, Ron found his voice as he looked first to the bed then to the three men surrounding it.  
  
"Bloody hell, what is he doing here!"  
  
As one, the three men turned in horror toward the source of the voice, but they were unable to say a word before Ron had strode across the room and bodily punched the figure on the bed square in the jaw.  
  
"Ron!" screamed Ginny and Hermione as the latter burst into tears as Sirius jumped from his place on the bed and physically shoved Ron away, and tripping over the abandoned chair, he fell to the floor with a loud bang.  
  
"NO ONE, LEAST OF ALL YOU, HAS ANY RIGHT TO HIT MY GODSON!" he roared at the top of his lungs as he brandished his fist as the red head on the floor in front of him  
  
"Wh.What!" exclaimed Ron once he had gotten over the shock of what had happed "Your godson?! Sirius, Harry is dead! This is some sort of death eater trick that he has managed to make you fall for!" he yelled back, not nearly as forcefully, but enough to make his point loud and clear.  
  
"Listen, boy" he said, stressing the last word "You have no idea what you are talking about, and as usual, you let your temper get the best of you, so listen carefully" he growled out through clenched teeth as he knotted his hand in the front of the prone mans robes "Either you control that temper and your actions, or leave" he said in a threatening whisper.  
  
"No, you listen, you psychotic bastard" said Ron in just as threatening of a voice "I don't know what game he is playing, but I do know this. That is not Harry Potter, and mark my words, Black, the first chance I get, I will take my revenge on the lives he has taken, and since Potter is dead already, I'll just have to kill his little wannabe here instead"  
  
"You will do nothing of the sort, Ronald" said the headmaster firmly from his spot as Sirius' side, he and Remus had thus far not spoken a word, merely stood to defend the child on the bed, but they both felt that it was beyond mere defense now and something had to be done.  
  
"I agree, Ron, you know not of what you speak" said Remus wearily  
  
"What do you mean, I know perfectly well what I'm talking about. He is nothing more than some death eater scum" he said vehemently, but before he could continue, the sound of a small cry stopped him  
  
"Stop it! All of you!" yelled Ginny with tears running down her face, but she wasn't looking at her brother or former professors, instead, she was looking around the three older men at the bed and they immediately forgot about what they were doing previously and hurried back to the bedside to find a very much awake and distraught form on it.  
  
Seeing that their attention was turned to him, Harry gathered all the strength he could muster and curled himself into a ball, his back toward the group and his arms latched tightly aground his knees, his body trembling in terror.  
  
"Oh, Merlin" said Sirius with his eyes wide and completely ignoring Ron now, he stumbled over to the bed "Harry?" he asked, hesitantly reaching out a hand to place on the boy's shoulder, but as soon as he touched it, the boy began to breath raggedly as he tried in vain to weakly move from the grasp. Noting his discomfort, Sirius withdrew his hand and continued to try and calm him down with his words and voice, noting with fury that the right cheek was already beginning to swell and bruise "Harry, listen to me" he tried again, but to no avail, instead, the teen began to mutter under his breath, but his words were easy to understand none the less and they only served to make Sirius feel even more terrible than he had in the past weeks.  
  
"No.no.please don't hurt me.not again.please no.please stop.no.no.please no.no.they will come, I know they will, they are my friends.no please stop.please.they are my friends.my family.Sirius.he will come.stop.please no.he won't leave me here.they won't leave me here.no please.they forgot about me.they don't care.please just kill me.please kill me.please" he begged the demons in his mind as his form continued to shake violently and Sirius felt tears come to his eyes at the words. Mutely, he turned to the headmaster.  
  
"Please, Albus, there's nothing I can do for him now" he pleaded, and with tears in his own eyes, the headmaster drew his wand and stunned the boy, his body immediately going limp and his breathing evening out slowly. As soon as he was sure his godson was resting peacefully, Sirius once again buried his head in his hands, allowing the silent tears to fall, completely forgetting about the three teens still in the doorway.  
  
As Ron and Hermione and Ginny watched the entire episode from their place in the doorway, they could do nothing but become overcome with their own thoughts and interpretations of what was transpiring before them. As soon as the headmaster said the stunning spell, Ginny felt the dense fog lift from her mind and was just able to catch Hermione as she started to fall to the floor in anguish. Wrapping one arm around the older girls waist to support her, she gripped Ron's robe sleeve in her other hand and began to maneuver the pair out of the ward, surprised by the lack of protests she received. They walked in complete silence all the way to the nursery office where GInn deposited Hermione in a chair by the fire before falling into the opposite one herself, noting that Ron followed suite without hesitation.  
  
The silence remained for nearly ten minutes before Ron managed to find his voice "What in the hell just happened?" he asked with wide eyes and a pale face  
  
"I wish I knew" said Hermione quietly, silent tears still leaking down her cheeks  
  
"I think I have an idea" whispered Ginny as she starred at a point directly in front of her face. Upon hearing her words, the other two immediately directed their attention toward the younger red head, waiting for to elaborate, which she did after some moments "How much of the conversation did the two of you hear before they knew we were there?" she asked after looking coolly at Ron, apparently still angry at his outburst.  
  
"Not much" admitted Hermione "I think I was in shock when I found out that they were talking to someone named Harry who knew both of us" she said quietly, her mind wandering back to the conversation she had heard clearly "They were talking about visions or something, and then he asked about us and the war"  
  
"That's all I heard too" admitted Ron  
  
"That's what I thought" said Ginny "While you two were in shock, I heard the rest of their conversation" she began "Apparently, the person up there really is Harry, be quiet Ron and let me finish. He had been captured during the third task and kept at the Riddle house for a year and a half before going to Azkaban where he stayed for another four years. It wasn't really Harry who did all of those things, but someone else trying to make us believe that it was Harry, and unfortunately, the entire world fell for it" she finished with her head bowed in shame.  
  
"Are you saying that you actually believe that scumbag is telling the truth, Gin?" asked Ron with wide eyes  
  
"Ron, did you hear what she said, it all makes sense now" began Hermione, comprehension dawning on her features as she began to count on her fingers, putting the points together "Harry started to change during fifth year, and that's when the imposter was here, but we just thought it had something to do with Cedric's death so we ignored it. Second, is there anything you can think of before fourth year that would lead you to believe that Harry would ever turn to Voldemort? Third, how many people besides Dumbledore and the two of us ever found out about Harry's visions? Fourth, what just happened was a panic attack of some sort, probably triggered by you hitting him, and seeing as it was obviously very genuine by his words and actions, he has been through severe physical abuse. And lastly, if Voldemort were going to send in someone to pretend to be Harry now, and the real one were dead, he wouldn't have sent someone who is in such terrible shape since those who are physically weak can't stand up to interrogations nearly as well as a healthy person" she concluded with a satisfied smirk on her face.  
  
"All very good points, Miss. Granger" said a voice from the office door and all three turned to see Dumbledore standing there with a tired smile on his face, Jessica standing right beside him with curious eyes.  
  
"Headmaster" said Ginny quickly, offering him one of the other chairs in front of the fire which he took with a grateful smile  
  
"Thank you, now I believe that you three probably have some questions for me" he said, looking pointedly to Ron who wasted absolutely no time.  
  
"Is he really Harry?" he asked, holding his breath as he waited for an answer  
  
"Yes, I can honestly say that he is, and before you ask, I slipped vertiserum into his drink and his answers convinced me that Harry Potter is indeed alive and has been held against his will for over five years as a prisoner of Voldemort's it was one of his followers who returned from the graveyard with Mr. Diggory's body" he said gravely  
  
"It really is him then?" asked Hermione hopefully, wanting it said one more time  
  
"Yes, it really is him" he answered and all three faces broke into wide smiles as they made to get up and return to the hospital wing to greet their friend, but his next words stopped them in their tracks "But I must warn you, he is not the same person that you remember, he has been physically tortured and emotionally scarred. Those who he trusted and loved the most didn't even know he was missing, and because of our terrible oversight, he has lost all trust in everyone, as you saw in the hospital wing, and it will take much time to rebuild that trust, if we can at all" he finished quietly and the three were immediately overcome with terrible guilt, not knowing what they could possibly do to make things right again, or even if they could.  
  
After the headmasters startling little speech, the three enlightened friends silently made their way in their separate directions, Hermione and Ron toward their beds in Ginny's room, and Ginny, claiming that she was going to check on the kids one more time, made her way back toward the hospital wing.  
  
A/N: Ok, next chapter is here! I hope you enjoy it and let me know what you think. I'm working on the next chapter of Too Good To Be True and it should be up shortly, as well as the next chapter of this story. Again, if you would like to join my yahoo group, feel free! Ok, as for now, I have to go, homework calls! 


	9. Losing Hope

hey guys, I know it's been a while, but the next chapter of  
  
reestablishing trust is done. Thank you all for your kind words, they meant a lot. I'll just give you a quick update on what has happened since the fire. the police are still investigating everything and no cause has been determined yet. the local paper did a big article on the fire and put picture of some of the horses lost in it, including both of my girls and a man who read the paper saw the pictures and called me to offer me a colt that he had, no strings attached and completely free. after some thought, I decided to take the baby, and I named him Dakota. he is a red and white paint colt, about six months old and sweet as can be. he'll never replace either of my girls, but he already has his own place in my heart. well, that's all for now, and I hope you enjoy the chapter!  
  
thanks again,  
  
misty  
  
Chapter 9-Losing Hope  
  
Harry was mad, actually, furious would be a better word to explain how he felt when he had been informed that no one had even noticed that he had been missing, but then that feeling was overcome by extreme depression and hurt, but before he was able to break down completely, he was hit by a sleeping spell and the next thing he knew was terror.  
  
He had been awakened by the all too familiar feeling of pain as he was hit forcefully in the face by an unseen fist. He became instantly aware of the sound of screaming and without even fully comprehending the words, he knew that they were mad, and he knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that they were mad at him, after all, they were always mad at him and he prepared for the onslaught of pain that always accompanied those certain tones and feelings and he just prayed that they would continue to argue amongst themselves and forget that he was even there, but he prayers were once again unanswered as their attention suddenly swerved to him.  
  
Sensing what was about to come, he used up the last of his strength and tried in what he knew would be a vain attempt to move away from his tormenters, but all he could muster was the strength to turn his back to them instead, and by doing so, he was suddenly seeing one of his first tortures at Azkaban, at the hands of Malfoy and McNair. This particular 'session' was one of his worst ever, because it was during this round of torture that he first began to believe that he was indeed going to die by their hands, that he was going to be left there forever, that his friends and family had forgotten about him, or had never really cared for him to start out with.  
  
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*  
  
He was in the small, hidden chamber, standing in the middle with the two death eaters standing before him. His wrists were bound together behind his back and his glasses had long since vanished, leaving him vulnerable and scared as the blurry images began to advance on him.  
  
"So, Potter, how do you like the accommodations?" sneered Malfoy as he began to stalk around the now fifteen year old boy "Do they suite the needs of the famous boy-who-lived?" he mocked.  
  
Harry, knowing by now that smart remarks would get him nowhere, remained silent, his emerald eyes silently watching the blurry image.  
  
"Answer me, boy!" yelled the man after several silent minutes had passed.  
  
"Where am I?" said Harry quietly. All he remembered was waking up in the basement of the Riddle house to the sounds of yelling before Voldemort had come down and cast the cruciatus curse on him. The next thing he knew, he was waking up here and being forced to his shaky feet.  
  
Instantly, a open palm was on his cheek and a loud smack echoed throughout the small chamber before Lucius spoke again "Do look at me with that look on your face, boy!" he growled and Harry immediately cast his gaze to the stone floor in submission.  
  
"I'm sorry, sir" he whispered, his previous 'lessons' at the Riddle house coming to his mind.  
  
"You would do well to remember that, Potter" he warned before resuming his pacing "As for your question, you have been brought to Azkaban, the dark lords new fortress" he said and Harry felt his eyes go wide. Through his visions, he knew that the death eaters had been trying to take over the prison, but he didn't know they had been successful. This meant that all the prisoners and dementors were free. How were the others going to overcome this? His foggy mind wondered and he saw images of Dumbledore, Sirius, Remus, and his friends flash before his eyes before a punch to his stomach brought him back to the present.  
  
"Pay attention when I'm talking to you, Potter" snarled Malfoy "As I was saying, the dark lord has asked us to give you a combined 'welcome home' and birthday gift this evening" he said with a malicious smirk on his features and Harry's brow furrowed in confusion at the mention of his birthday, completely blocking out the part about 'welcome home', and Malfoy, seeing this, plastered a wide smile across his features before he spoke again "Oh, I guess we forgot to tell you the date Potter, it's July 31st, happy sixteenth birthday" he said mockingly just before the beating began in earnest.  
  
At first, Harry was able to tolerate the beating in silence, curled in a small ball on the stone floor, his mind spinning with the new revelation. Had it really been over a year since that night in the graveyard? He couldn't believe it, there was no way that Sirius and the others would have allowed him to be a prisoner for so long. He wouldn't believe it.  
  
Suddenly, his attention was brought back to the beating as he felt the now familiar pain of the cruciatus curse raking through his body. The pain lasted for what felt like an eternity before it ended abruptly, yet his muscles still trembled and he found he was barely able to remain standing when McNair forced him to his feet again, facing Malfoy.  
  
"Did you enjoy that, Potter? I will stop, you know, if you beg me enough, I will stop" he said quietly "Will you beg?" he asked before he cast the cruciatus again.  
  
"No" said Harry once the curse was lifted and he was again on his feet.  
  
"Will you beg?" asked Malfoy again as he cast the curse for the third time.  
  
"no" repeated Harry, causing Malfoy's face to contort in rage before he smirked again.  
  
"As you wish, Potter, you have had your chance" he said quietly as he leveled his wand on the kneeling figure before him "Petrificus Partialius" he said and Harry felt his legs straighten and all of his muscles tighten against his will as he fell to his back on the stone floor, but strangely enough, he could still move his head freely "I will no longer give you control of where this stops, I choose when to leave, cutlius" he snarled and through the corner of his eye, Harry saw the shining blade of a large knife being levitated toward him, and he knew without a doubt that this would be painful, that thought still running through his mind as the first cut was made, down the length of his left thigh. He couldn't stop the flow of words that this action triggered next, his brain clouded as it was with the pain. When the knife was removed from his leg, he looked to Malfoy pleadingly, his voice no more than a whisper as he said the words that he never though he would say.  
  
"Please don't hurt me anymore" he begged and the man only laughed as the knife continued its advance, this time slicing down his right arm, sending his head spiraling in pain as he bit his lower lip in an attempt to not cry out.  
  
"not again.please no.please stop.no.no.please no.no." he repeated over and over again as the edges of his vision became blurry and his ears rang with the sounds of Malfoy and McNair laughing.  
  
"I gave you a chance, Potter, and you refused it" taunted Malfoy after what felt like an eternity "What do you think of your precious friends now, for allowing you to suffer like this?" he asked suddenly  
  
"They will come, I know they will, they are my friends" he whispered, hoping it was true but doubting it himself now.  
  
"But why haven't they come yet, Potter? It has been so long and they have yet to rescue you, why?" he taunted "Perhaps it is because to them, you were only a celebrity, their way of destroying Voldemort, and now that you're gone, they see no need in trying to get you back, they really don't care for you, do they?" he asked as he brought the knife back to the bloody body on the floor, slicing it across his stomach.  
  
"no please stop.please" Harry begged and after another eternity of pain, the knife was once again removed from his flesh.  
  
"Well, you never did answer my question, Potter, what do you have to say?" he asked and Harry weakly answered him through the haze.  
  
"They are my friends.my family.Sirius.he will come" he said defiantly and Malfoy, enraged, sent the knife back again.  
  
"Stop.please no" he cried as his blood was once again spilled onto the stone floor  
  
"Where is your godfather now, Potter? Where are your friends?" taunted Malfoy  
  
"He won't leave me here.they won't leave me here" he mumbled through the pain and the blackness overtaking him  
  
"But they already have, he already has" said Malfoy, his voice the only thing reaching Harry now that his vision was completely black  
  
"No please.they forgot about me.they don't care" he mumbled, tears leaking down his face for the first time since the graveyard  
  
"Do you want to die, Potter?" asked Malfoy suddenly  
  
"Please just kill me.please kill me.please" he slurred through the pain  
  
"Not today, Potter, not today. The dark lord wants that honor. McNair, give him a healing potion and a nutrition potion and then secure him" ordered Malfoy and Harry felt his head roughly lifted from the stone floor and two potions poured down his throat and his arms released before being encircled in another chain, then the body bind was released before the blackness completely overtook him yet again.  
  
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*  
  
The next time that Harry awoke, the hospital wing was shrouded in shadows and the only sound that met his ears was the deep and steady breathing from somewhere to his right, though he couldn't see who was there. For several moments, he wondered just why it was that he couldn't see the person, but then he remembered with terrible clarity that he had only been able to see from his left eye for a long time now, and with that though, he was almost overwhelmed with another memory, but he forced himself to breath deeply and focus his thoughts elsewhere and he was able to keep the scenes buried for a little longer.  
  
Remembering the sound of someone beside him, he silently turned his head and the blurry image of his godfather met his tired gaze, and judging by the awkward angle his neck was bend, he assumed that the older man was asleep. Deciding that he didn't really want to wake the man and be pulled into yet another tense conversation, he allowed his mind to wander to his own thoughts, for no other reason than to forget about the memory that he had been forced to relive when that person had hit him.  
  
Sure, he was still quite angry about the whole situation, that he had been forgotten and judged because of another's actions, but deep down, he was more relieved to be out of that terrible torture chamber in which he had been imprisoned for the past five years.  
  
Five years. Five long and pain filled years at the hands of the most evil dark lord that the wizarding world had ever seen and his most trusted, loyal, and evil death eaters. He still couldn't believe that it had really been that long since he had been at Hogwarts, since he had been free from pain and misery. Sure, he had know it had been a long time, but surely not that long, but he now knew that it had. His best friends were no longer the naïve fourteen year olds that he remembered. No, he had seen them himself for a moment before the memories became too much to handle. Ron was no longer the gangly redheaded boy with his youthful face splattered in freckles and his robes several inched too short on his arm and ankles, overshadowed by his older brothers. Now, he was tall and muscular, and even though his robes were still not the best of quality, no doubt due to the war, they were of the proper size for his adult form.  
  
Hermione, on the other hand, had developed into a beautiful woman, her body looking mature and her once bushy hair taming down enough to be pulled into a neat bun. Perhaps the most shocking change of all though, is what he saw on their faces. They were not the expressions that one would normally expect to see on nineteen year olds who were supposed to be enjoying the best years of their lives. Quite opposite, in fact, their faces looked far older, like they had seen too much in their short years. Their eyes were tired and their skin lined with premature wrinkles, faint, yet still present. Ginny, once seen only as his best friends little sister, had also aged too much in such a short time, and had he not seen her several times during his visions, he wouldn't have been able to recognize her with her mature figure and now long red hair.  
  
That is what was most shocking to Harry, more so than anything else. During his entire captivity, he had been assaulted by visions nearly every night, and on more than one occasion, he had seen familiar faces, for everything Voldemort saw during the many battles, Harry saw as well. He saw the deaths of Charlie and Percy Weasley, Cornilius Fudge, Dean Thomas, Cho Chang, and many others that he would rather have never seen. During these horrible visions, though, he did see things that gave him the smallest bit of hope, the members of the light side fighting with all they had to keep their dreams and future alive, no matter what the odds were against them, and during most, if not all of those epic battles, he saw more than one familiar face fighting. His best friends, godfather, professors, and others were at the forefront of this war and seeing their valiant effort gave him the hope to carry on when he no longer thought that he could.  
  
As his thoughts paused there, he heard the sound of shifting from the chair beside him and he turned his gaze to meet the sleepy one of his godfather.  
  
"Hey" Sirius said quietly when he saw that Harry was awake "How are you feeling?" he asked  
  
"Better" answered Harry just as quietly, keeping his gaze focused to his clasped hands instead of looking into Sirius' worried eyes  
  
"Are you hungry? Thirsty?" asked Sirius when Harry said nothing else  
  
"Not really" he responded "Where is everyone else?" he asked timidly, dreading the answer, worried that Ron, Hermione, and Ginny still believed him to be a killer.  
  
"Bed, it's about two in the morning" answered Sirius "Don't worry, Dumbledore talked to them and explained everything. They want to see you later, when you're feeling more up to it that is" he added hastily upon seeing the fearful look on his godson's face.  
  
"Oh, ok then" he said, then paused for a moment as though trying to gather his thoughts "What about you?" he finally asked  
  
"I believe the truth, that you are my godson, the son of my best friend, and that someone has been trying to tarnish your good name by doing horrendous deeds for the past five years while you were hurt in ways I can't even begin to imagine. Harry, I'm so sorry" he said suddenly and Harry had no idea how to respond, so he said the first thing that came to mind.  
  
"What?' he asked dumbly  
  
"I'm sorry Harry, you were right to get angry with us earlier. We are your family and we didn't even realize that you were gone until we found you, and even then we didn't even believe that it was you. What kind of family are we if we don't even realize that you had been missing for over five years?" he asked with his eyes glazing over with tears  
  
"The kind that was taken in by a very elaborate hoax constructed by a very intelligent man and who no proof on the contrary of what they had seen with their own eyes, someone who looked exactly like me with the dark mark on his arm killing and torturing those who fought against his master" said Harry bluntly, his voice showing no emotion what so ever.  
  
"Exactly, we should never have fallen for something so ludicrous as that, we all knew you would never do those things" said Sirius, begging for his godson's forgiveness  
  
"But you did, Sirius, you did and that's what matters" said Harry, finally looking into his godfathers eyes.  
  
What Sirius saw there made him feel even worse than he already did. The one green eye was hard and showed absolutely no emotion, as though he had resigned himself to what he said, that no one really cared for him as a person, only him as the hero of the wizarding world until the instant they found reason to turn on him. He thought that it would be like that for the rest of his life because of what had happened to him in the past years, and seeing this, Sirius vowed to himself that he would never allow this to happen, no matter what it took. As he made this silent promise, Harry had turned his back to his godfather and curled into a small ball and once again fell asleep, hoping his dreams would be filled of better times and not the constant horrors of Voldemort and his followers, but his prayers, as always, went unanswered. 


	10. Visions of Truths

Chapter 10  
  
He was standing in the main hall of Azkaban, a place he recognized, not from his own memories but from previous visions. Around him were hundreds of black clad death eaters, all with their hoods drawn up and their masks firmly in place, making them all appear identical save their heights.  
  
Only one man was standing in the hall though, the rest were kneeling on the floor with their eyes downcast, all in utter silence. The one figure, though, caused Harry's stomach to lurch painfully as he watched him pace restlessly. Voldemort, the one responsible for everything that had gone wrong in his life and more pain than he thought imaginable was waiting for something.  
  
It didn't take long though, for the thing he was waiting for to arrive, as mere moments later, the great stone doors at the end of the hall burst open and thirteen new figures entered, none of these wearing any sort of covering, clad instead in the typical robes of a death eater among the inner circle, and the sight of them almost made Harry even more sick as painful images assaulted his mind, for it was these thirteen men who were the only ones aware of his existence in that hell besides their master, and the ones who took sick pleasure in torturing him to the brink of sanity and life.  
  
He could recognize each and every one of them by their footsteps alone, having heard them more often than he could count and he closed his eyes and tried to close his ears against the ghosts of pain and stinging words that they had each inflicted upon him.  
  
"Lucius, I hope for your sake that you have something worthwhile to report" hissed the dark lord as the men stopped before him and bowed their heads in assign of respect for their leader.  
  
"My Lord, the prison has been abandoned, no one remains, dead or alive" said the blonde man in a voice that rang through the hall and even though he was not looking, Harry knew that the others were nodding their heads in agreement with what the right hand man of Voldemort had reported.  
  
"Fools!" cried he evil man so suddenly that Harry began to tremble "Because of you I have lost the only guarantee I had of winning this war!" he bellowed and Harry forced his eyes open just in time to see Voldemort brandish his wand onto one of his followers kneeling just before him and with a flash of green light the man fell to the floor dead before he realized what was happening.  
  
"My Lord?" asked a voice from the front row as the inner circle took their places behind their lord to watch the proceedings.  
  
"Speak" commanded the evil voice and at once the figure stood and began speaking and after only the first word, Harry recognized the voice as that of his school time rival, Draco Malfoy.  
  
"Sir, what prisoner was so important that they could determine the outcome of the war? All of those who were held here had proved useless to your cause and were left here to be tortured to madness by the dementors until their eventual deaths? Were they not?" he asked, his head bowed the entire time.  
  
As soon as the words had left his mouth, his master began laughing, that cold and heartless laugh that had haunted Harry's dreams for the entirety of his life and he felt as though his blood had turned to ice upon hearing it.  
  
"You are quite mistaken, young Malfoy, but I will allow you to go unpunished for your cheek long enough to hear what I have to say. You are correct in assuming that the prisoners here were left to their own deaths and insanity, but there was one prisoner here that was only known about by my most trusted followers and myself, and it was he that I was trying to keep hidden for the time being, but due to the ineptitude of you fellows, he has managed to elude me yet again. You see, young Malfoy, there was one prisoner here that no one was to know about, and if that fool Dumbledore managed to get his muggle loving hands on him, we have all but lost this war."  
  
"But m Lord, who could be so important that they could take away from us all that we have earned?" asked Draco  
  
"Perhaps you are not as intelligent as your father led me to believe, Draco, but I will humor you long enough to answer your question. Hidden in a cell only known to myself and a select few of my followers was the boy- who-lived himself, and now, he is back in the hands of Dumbledore despite all that I have done to insure that he was never found" hissed the dark lord angrily, and with another green flash, another death eater fell down dead.  
  
"My lord, I had thought that Harry Potter was dead, by the hands of his own godfather some time ago?" said Draco clearly confused  
  
"You thought wrong, Draco, the person whom was killed by Sirius Black was one of my loyal servants who has been disguised as Potter since the night of our last meeting together, and the real Potter has been a prisoner of mine since that night" he answered, before turning his back on Draco and facing his inner circle, and at once, Malfoy Sr. stepped forward and inclined his head, asking permission to speak.  
  
"Yes, Lucius?" asked Voldemort  
  
"My Lord, Potter has been you prisoner for over five years now, it is highly unlikely that he will be sane enough, if he is even still alive, to be of any aid to the enemy, given the fact that he has been tortured relentlessly for the past years and the dementors haven't left his cell since the day he was brought here" he said and slowly a twisted smile crossed the dark lords features  
  
"You might be correct Lucius, but that won't stop me from punishing those who caused me to loose him. Crucio!" he bellowed and Draco fell to the floor, screaming in agony, followed closely by many others as the entire inner circle began cursing the lower ranking death eaters.  
  
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~  
  
Harry, feeling the pain of every curse Voldemort cast, was suffering as well thousands of miles away, but he bore his pains in silence for the nearly two hours that they lasted before he was thrown out of the vision.  
  
Sirius was lying in the bed beside his godson, catching a few hours of sleep while the teenager did the same, but he was awakened suddenly by the sound of a faint gasp and shuffling from the bed beside him.  
  
He was on his feet in an instant and stumbled over to his godson's side, delayed momentarily by his own clumsiness as he tripped over the foot of his bed and fell face first to the hard ground, but after a few choice curses, he was back on his feet again, rubbing a sore knee and leaning over Harry's bed.  
  
"Harry? Harry!" he asked worriedly, but there was no reaction from the figure and Sirius blinked rapidly to clear his sleep fogged mind before he could truly comprehend what he was seeing, and when he did, he did the first thing he could think of "Madame Pomfrey!" he bellowed at the top of his lungs.  
  
The nurse was at his side in an instant, seeing at once what he was so worked up about. Her patient was curled into a tight ball on his side, with one arm wrapped securely around his knees and the other palm pressed tightly to his forehead, but between the white fingers seeped a thin trail of dark red blood. His emaciated form was consistently being wracked with severe tremors, and his entire body was coated in a thin sheen of sweat.  
  
"What happened?" she demanded immediately as she fumbled for her wand that had been up the sleeve of her robes.  
  
"I don't know, I just woke up and saw him like this!" said Sirius frantically as Harry began to thrash about on the bed.  
  
"Hold his shoulders down; we don't want him to hurt himself anymore than he already is" she commanded as she began to wave her wand over him, muttering spells under her breath the entire time. It was nearly five minutes later when she jumped back and brandished her wand around the ward, looking frantically into every shadowed corner, and at that moment, Harry fell limp and appeared to be unconscious, allowing Sirius to look toward the matron in curiosity.  
  
"What is it, Poppy?" he asked as he regained his breath and wiped his own sweaty hair from his eyes.  
  
"Shh, someone else is here" she whispered and at once, Sirius had his own wand in his hand, positioning himself between Harry's bed and the rest of the ward as he too looked around.  
  
"How do you know?" he whispered back without looking at the woman.  
  
"Harry was under the cruciatus curse" she said heavily, and upon hearing her words, Sirius nearly dropped his wand in shock and horror before he came back to his senses and in the blink of an eye, Padfoot stood in his place and began to sniff the air of the hospital wing thoroughly, and after a quick trip around the vast room, he transformed back into himself and pocketed his wand.  
  
"There's no one here besides the three of us" he said in a normal voice as he turned back to Harry's bed where he gently turned the teenager back on to his back before he gently brushed the sweaty hair off the pale forehead, carefully avoiding the sore scar.  
  
"Keep an eye on him for a minute, please Sirius, I'm going to go and tell the headmaster what has happened" she said as she turned and strode quickly back to her office and distantly he could hear her speaking to Dumbledore through the fire there.  
  
She returned only a minute later and began to rummage through the cabinets in search of potions, which she apparently couldn't find because he then heard her speaking to Severus from her office as well before she again joined him beside the bed.  
  
"Has he begun to wake up yet?" she asked as she again waved her wand over his form.  
  
"No" answered Sirius as he watched her work, but when she raised his wrist to feel his pulse, he found himself speaking again "I thought you said that you had healed all of the scars that were on visible areas of his body?" he said as he caught sight of the underside of Harry's wrist where three parallel lines were clearly visible on the pale skin that was otherwise unmarked.  
  
"I did, but not even I can remove scars from self inflicted wounds" she said absentmindedly as she used her wand to clear away the remaining traces of blood from Harry's forehead.  
  
"Self inflicted wounds, what do you." Sirius began before he felt the blood drain from his own face as the meaning of her words sank in "Do you mean that he tried to.kill himself?" he asked quietly, stumbling slightly over the words.  
  
Pomfrey looked at him sadly for a moment before organizing her answer into something both professional and yet reassuring for the man to hear "I think he did, Sirius, but the scars are quite old, and given what he has been forced to endure, we could have expected no less. Harry is one of the strongest people I have ever known, but he has been imprisoned and tortured for the last five years, and he is still only a teenager, a teenager who has been through more in the past nineteen years of his life than a dozen of the strongest wizards have been through put together. Now, will you please help me get him into some dry night cloths before the headmaster and Severus show up?" she asked, and Sirius put the more worrying thoughts from his mind in order to help her, and by the time they were done, the other two men had joined them in the room and he watched as Severus administered the post cruciatus potion while they were brought up to speed on what had happened a shortly before.  
  
"Sirius, would you please help Severus search the grounds?" he asked and without argument, the two men began to stride toward the door of the wing, closing the curtains around the bed behind them. Before they had made it to the doors though, they opened of their own accord and in strode a familiar figure clad in the traditional robes of a death eater, the likes of which Snape himself had worn up until his discovery as a spy nearly two years before, escaping with his life thanks to the emergency portkey that Dumbledore had insisted he keep on his person at all times.  
  
To the untrained eye, Draco appeared to be his normal, arrogant self, but to these two men, it was obvious that he had been punished for something that night, even though he tried to hide it.  
  
"Do either of you know where the headmaster is?" he asked, forgoing the pleasantries and getting right to the point of the matter, but before they could respond, Dumbledore approached from behind them.  
  
"Mr. Malfoy? Are you ok?" he asked immediately  
  
"Fine, sir" he said briskly before striding the rest of the way across the room till he was standing directly in front of the three older men. "Headmaster, it's about Potter, he's not dead sir" he began bluntly  
  
"I know, my boy" he said quietly as he laid a hand on Draco's shoulder  
  
"No, you don't understand! It wasn't Potter who joined the death eaters! It was an imposter, a loyal follower posing as Potter, and it was he who was killed, not Potter" he said as he took a quick breath before continuing "Harry has been kept a prisoner of Voldemort's since the tournament in our fourth year. He was kept in a hidden cell and tortured by Voldemort and the inner circle, no one else knew he was even there, and now he's missing. If what my father said is true, we have to fine him, he's hurt and might or might not even be sane, but if Voldemort finds him first, we have nothing left and we have already lost this war" he said in a rush.  
  
"Draco, come here, there is something I want you to see" said Dumbledore before turning to the other two "Gentlemen, please join us, I think I understand what has happened now" he said before striding back toward the enclosed bed with the other three close behind.  
  
When Draco had returned from the meeting at Azkaban, after what felt like endless curses being thrown at him and his fellows, he proceeded directly to the headmasters office, but when he had learned that it was empty, he turned in the intent of going instead to the dungeons, but on his way there, he passed Nearly Headless Nick who had informed him that the headmaster had been seen hurrying in the direction of the hospital wing a short time before, so he changed his direction yet again.  
  
He arrived in the white room out of breath and had the matter not been so urgent, he would have first requested a pain killing potion before he relayed the news, but not tonight. He had never been able to truly believe that Potter would willingly join the dark lord, not until he saw the black haired former classmate participating so willingly in one of their regular torturing sessions of a group of muggles, and the fanatical gleam in the cold green eyes had convinced him at once, and when Potter had been openly accepted as the heir of Voldemort and joined his master in the punishments of the less loyal or successful death eaters, he had known it in his heart as well.  
  
This is why the news that he had received had affected him so, for he had believed for so long now that the one cursing him had been Potter when in fact, Potter had been subjected to the same treatment continuously for over five years, over a quarter of his life he had been tortured, and now, when they should all be out looking for the undoubtedly insane teenager, they were instead taking a jolly stroll through the hospital wing. Cursing silently to himself, Draco followed Dumbledore, Black and Snape to the very last bed in the wing, where curtains separated it from the view of the rest of the ward.  
  
The aged headmaster walked wearily around the curtains, and when Draco joined him on the other side, he nearly gave into his urge to allow his jaw to hang open and fall to the floor in shock. There, on the bed only a meter from him was a figure that was so easily identifiable, yet so alien to him that he recognized it at once.  
  
"Potter?" he asked in shock, looking to the headmaster for confirmation which he immediately gave in the form of a slight nod.  
  
It was defiantly his school time rival, with the unmistakable black hair, albeit quite a bit longer than the last time he had seen him and not the imposter, toward the end of their fourth year, and the telltale scar was clearly visible on the too pale skin, looking red and raw as though it had been cut anew.  
  
His skin was so pale that it appeared nearly translucent, and though the backs of his arms were completely free of marks, no doubt due to the strongest healing charms, he could see several thick and raised areas along his neck and descending down under his shirt which was unbuttoned at the collar. It was only then that he realized that his old enemy was covered in a very thin sheen of sweat, and that every exposed muscle was shuddering, at a rate nearly triple what his own were doing at the same time.  
  
"What happened to him?" he asked hesitantly, and all three knew that he wasn't speaking of the old injuries.  
  
"Correct me if I am mistaken, Mr. Malfoy, but I believe that Voldemort punished many of you tonight" he said and Draco mutely nodded in assent.  
  
"I believe then, that Harry was pulled into a vision of this punishment since the dark lord was in an especially angry mood, and due to the connection that they share through Harry's scar, he not only saw but felt the spells that were cast to some extent, by the looks of it, the Cruciatus curse" he finished heavily  
  
"How will he be able to survive this, Albus?" asked Sirius as he gripped the limp hand of his godson  
  
"We can only hope that his will is strong enough to stand up to it, for I fear that this is only the beginning and there is nothing else we can do, there is no potion that is able to block visions, and if the emotions of Voldemort are strong, like tonight, he could even be pulled into one while he is awake" he answered as he buried his head in his hands in an attempt to relieve the pressure that had been building behind his eyes all night long. "Mr. Malfoy, Severus, why don't you two retire to your rooms for the night, and please, Severus, could you brew some more post cruciatus potion tomorrow, I fear Harry will be needing it when he awakens, and many times after tonight. Sirius, you should get some sleep as well, he won't awaken until at least late morning and he will need you when he does. I shall be in my office if any of you need me" he said before standing and gently brushing the hair from Harry's face before he left the room with Snape and Draco behind him. Sirius stood and made his way back to his previous bed where he eventually fell into a restless sleep.  
  
When Harry awoke, it was barely daylight and he could hear the sounds of muffled snores coming from somewhere off to his right, but other than that, the entire hospital wing was completely silent, allowing him some time to think about all that had happened in the last twenty four hours. Aside from his vision the night before, which he would like to think never happened but was proving difficult with the sharp pains and constant tremors that were attacking his muscles, the entire day had been complicated and tiring and more than a little shocking to say the least.  
  
It was no longer a question of how this had all happened, but now more a question of where to go from here. He understood that everyone was more than sorry about what had happened, and that they were appalled at themselves for not discovering the truth sooner, but he had been stuck in hell for over five years and they had all believed that he, the boy-who- lived and the one to always lookout for others before himself, would turn traitor and join the one who he had spent his entire life fighting against. Sure, they had all apologized for what had happened, but was sorry enough to fix the wrongs? Could he ever begin to forgive them for this, or more importantly, trust anyone ever again after this? All those he had ever trusted had betrayed him, and trust was something that Harry Potter did not give easily, even before his capture thanks to his less than stellar childhood.  
  
Now, the only question that remained after his silent musings was this; where do I go from here? Only time would ever hold the answer.  
  
A/N: Sorry, hard drive crashed, next update will be sooner if I don't loose everything I write, TGTBT will be updated this weekend. Have a Happy Thanksgiving those who celebrate it. Thank you all and for those of you that asked, I'm much better now and my new colt, Dakota is doing great. I have pictures of him on my yahoo group as well as both of my girls that I lost. Let me know what you think of this, please!? ~Tismy~ 


	11. Catching Up

With those thoughts in his overwhelmed but still foggy mind, Harry surveyed as much of the hospital wing as he could see, which wasn't much since his bed was separated from the rest. He needed time to think, without anyone else around, and he couldn't do that here. He needed to find some place where he could be alone, and this decided, his mind settled on its goal and now he just had to get his body to follow it and make it out without being discovered by Sirius or the mediwitch, so he carefully listened. The only sounds he heard were from the neighboring bed, and he was almost positive that they were coming from Sirius.  
  
Carefully gathering all of his strength, he sat up in his bed and with much effort, pushed the blankets off his legs, noting with disgust just how thin and frail they looked before focusing on his goal. He shifted his weight silently until his legs were swung over the side of the bed, a feat taught to him in part by living with the Dursleys but mostly by trying in vain not to be noticed by his guards during his imprisonment, weather they be death eaters or dementors. After doing this though, he was forced to sit for several moments in order to catch his breath so that he could go on again. After another quick listen of the rest of the wing, he gripped the bed post tightly in both hands and pushed himself off the bed, only to feel his legs give out immediately causing the rest of his body to fall gracelessly onto the ground.  
  
Instantly, there were strong hands picking him back up and he unconsciously held his breath and tightened all his muscles in preparation for the blows that were to come, forgetting for a moment where he was, but they never did, instead, he found himself being carefully lifted from the floor and being laid back onto his bed. "What were you thinking Harry?" asked a voice he recognized at once as his godfathers, causing him to relax slowly and start breathing regularly again.  
  
"Trying to get out of bed" he answered as though he were stating the most obvious thing in the world once he could talk without his voice wavering due to the exhaustion that his efforts had caused.  
  
"I could see that, but why?" asked Sirius with a chuckle as he settled himself beside his godson.  
  
"No real reason" said Harry quietly with a shrug as he turned his head away from Sirius to stare at his own hands, both of which were trembling no matter how hard he tried to force them to stop.  
  
"So, how are you feeling?" he asked after an awkward silence.  
  
"I've felt worse" answered Harry indifferently, still staring at his hands and after another several minutes of silence, during which Sirius was sure he had fallen back asleep, he became frustrated and decided to ask the questions that had been plaguing him all morning "Ho much longer will I be like this?" he asked in a voice barely above a whisper.  
  
"What do you mean?" asked the older man in curiosity, his brow furrowed.  
  
"Look at me Sirius; I'm what, nineteen years old now" he asked and when Sirius nodded in confirmation he continued "Nineteen and no taller than the average third or fourth year. I can't even stand on my own two feet without falling over! Every one of my muscles is constantly either shaking or throbbing. I can't stand for anyone to even touch me. My knowledge is equal to that of a fourteen year-old when it comes to magic. Hell, I can't even go to sleep without having either visions about what He is doing to others or nightmares about what He and his followers have done to me. Will it ever end? Will I ever get the chance to be normal again?" he asked, but there was little hope in his voice, only resignation and despair that he never would achieve either of these dreams. "My friends have all graduated and gone on with their lives and I can't even get out of a hospital bed without falling down" he muttered almost as an afterthought. During his entire speech, his voice was firm, but quiet, and Sirius doubted that anyone more than a bed or two away from them could even hear him talking even though he was obviously furious.  
  
"Harry, look at me" said Sirius gently and when he didn't, he placed his hand beneath his chin, and ignoring the almost violent flinch, turned the younger face toward his own, noticing the tear tracks running down the cheeks as he did so "Harry, I know that this is hard for you right now, and I can't assure you that things will get any easier as long as Voldemort is around" he began, stumbling slightly over his words when he noticed Harry wince upon hearing the name that he once spoke himself without fear "But I can assure you that once you have had enough time to recover, you will be able to walk the castle again on your own, and you will catch up with your friends and graduate. It will take time and hard work, but you will do it, of that, I am certain" he finished confidently.  
  
"So are the rest of us" said a voice from behind him, and they both turned to see the headmaster, Poppy, Ron, Hermione and Ginny standing there, all with small smiles on their own faces.  
  
Harry was overwhelmed by the extremity of the emotions he began to experience all at once. First was surprise at seeing them all there vowing to help him any way they could. The next was anger at them thinking that they even could help him, but that was quickly replaced by resignation.  
  
They couldn't be blamed for what had happened, as far as they had known, he had returned from the graveyard a changed person, and he imagined that if he had really returned, he would not have been the same after the experiences of that night. The next emotion was doubt, could he ever truly recover?  
  
And the final emotion that he felt was guilt, guilt for what all of them would be feeling when they realized that he never would recover, not really. True, he would probably be able to leave the hospital wing under his own power, and with enough effort and their help, he would finish his schooling.  
  
But he would always be plagued by the nightmares, and until He was gone, the visions as well. The injuries he received would always remain with him, of this he was certain. After all, his hands hadn't stopped trembling at any point while he was conscious since the second week of his imprisonment, nor had his muscles ever really stopped aching, both due no doubt to the extreme overexposure to the cruciatus curse he had endured.  
  
Added to this was the fact that many of his scars would always remain. Poppy had been able to heal nearly all of the most visible ones, on his face, neck, and lower arm, all but one that started below his left ear and continued down his chest and his famous curse scar on his forehead as well as the scar on the inside of his elbow from Wormtail's dagger. Besides these, she had been unable to remove the trio of scars that adorned each of his wrists, a vain attempt to end his own suffering shortly after his arrival on the island of Azkaban.  
  
Oh how he remembered that night, he still had nightmares about it. Malfoy had found him unconscious in a pool of his own blood, clutching at a rough rock he had found in the corner of his cell. To say he had been furious would have been an understatement at the very least. When he had awoken some hours later, he found that he was chained to the wall beside the small cot in the cell, unable to move far enough away to even stand up or move off the cot.  
  
The blood had been left on the stone floor, but there was something new there as well, and it took him a moment without his glasses to see that there was a pair of bodies on the floor. Before he could really comprehend what that meant, Malfoy and He came into the cell, a man between them, clearly under the imperious curse.  
  
Over the next few minutes, he had learned that the bodies were those of muggles that had 'graciously given their own blood to save him', as Malfoy had put it, and died due to the extreme amounts needed. He had then been forced to watch as they tortured the man with them, the doctor who had saved him, because he knew too much and couldn't be allowed to live, was what he had been told.  
  
They left after he was dead and the dementors returned, but they left all three bodies behind for him so that he could remember the consequences of his actions, and remember he did. He had remained chained to that wall for the rest of him imprisonment, over four years without standing on his own two feet, and every time he looked at the dark spot that still stained the stone, he remembered his only attempt to end the misery himself.  
  
He could end his own life with no regrets, but he couldn't bear if anyone else died because of him again. The bodies had stayed in his cell for about a week before they were removed, and he was left with only the scars and memories, that they were killed so that he would live.  
  
Looking at the scars now, he had another flash of the doctors' face when he had been released from the imperious curse, the dread that what he was seeing was real, that Harry Potter was a prisoner of the dark lords. But then the curses started and his expression was one of pain instead for an agonizingly long time before he died, the screams ringing through the normally silent passages before they were silenced forever. But the screams remained etched in his mind thanks in part to the dementors that never left his cell on the island.  
  
Madame Pomfrey had told him that these scars were unable to be removed because doing so would require so much magical energy that it would knock the caster out and overload his own body, so these scars were forced to remain along with the plethora of others that adorned his upper arms, back, chest, and legs, all for the same reason. But none of the others were visible when he was wearing normal wizarding attire, or even most muggle clothing as well, so long as he wore long pants and a tee shirt or robes, no one would ever notice them.  
  
A quite cough brought him back from his daydreams to the group of people standing around him, a group that he had no idea about what to say to, but luckily, Sirius rescued him.  
  
"Why don't you get some rest, Harry, and we'll all go down to have some lunch" he suggested, and at the slight nod of his godson's head, they all departed, saying goodbye's as they left. Soon, he was alone and after drinking another potion from the mediwitch, he was falling back into a restless sleep.  
  
The next couple of weeks passed in much the same way, with Harry slowly recovering in the hospital wing, his progress hindered by the four death eater meetings held during the time, all with Voldemort still furious about the lack of progress in finding him, cursing and even killing many of his followers out of anger, and the nightmares that plagued his sleep. Despite His anger, though, none of these meetings came close to that first one at Azkaban, usually only leaving Harry sore, shaky, and exhausted once he had been released from them.  
  
The headmaster and members of the order who were aware of Harry's presence and problem were working around the clock to try and find a way to block the effects of the curses, but as of yet, they had been unsuccessful.  
  
The days usually found him napping in his bed in the hospital wing, or speaking quietly to Sirius, the older man doing most of the talking, speaking about only light topics, such as his days in school and the various pranks that the marauders played or other humorous events that had occurred in the past years and while he was on the run.  
  
Remus was a regular visitor as well, and though he couldn't stay long due to his teaching duties, Harry was grateful for his company and the distractions that his visits caused because he and Sirius would start up a playful banter about something, and in the end Harry would be smiling slightly, temporarily forgetting his own memories and nightmares.  
  
He hadn't seen Ron and Hermione since the morning after his first vision, and according to Sirius, they had been sent out on a mission for Dumbledore together, though he wouldn't say what the mission was.  
  
Ginny, too had been absent from the hospital wing, and according to his godfather, she had been out searching the muggle orphanages for wizarding children who had been orphaned in order to bring them back to Hogwarts.  
  
In all that had happened, there were perhaps two things that surprised him more than any others, the first being that the wizarding world was no longer a secret from the muggles at all, and the second being that Ginny had managed to graduate from Hogwarts a year early and was not only an auror like her brother, but was in training to be a mediwitch.  
  
When he had asked why she was not on the front lines like Hermione and Ron, Remus had explained that given her past experiences with Tom Riddle that the headmaster had decided to use her skills in different ways, though he wouldn't explain what these ways were.  
  
The headmaster had also stopped by several times, but his visits were always relating to how he was doing and if he had seen anything that he needed to know in his visions, and every time he saw the old man Harry was shocked at how weary and tired he looked compared to his first four years of school. Snape had delivered a large batch of post cruciatus potion the day after his first vision, but he hadn't said anything to Harry, leaving as soon as the vials had been received by the mediwitch.  
  
Other than this, Harry had seen no one else since he had arrived, and even though his bed was separated from the others in the ward, his hearing was still extremely sensitive and he hadn't heard the first conversation between Madame Pomfrey and a student since his arrival.  
  
When he asked the woman where the students were, she had told him with a kind smile that all non emergency cases were now treated by healers from St. Mungos in the chamber on the third floor where he had encountered a certain three headed dog during his first year, and since there had been no death eater attacks during the past weeks, the hospital wing had been thankfully empty.  
  
During this time, his health had markedly improved, and he had started to put on some desperately needed weight, though he was still thinner than even Sirius had been after his escape.  
  
His hands still shook constantly, and his muscles were far from strong, and his energy levels still pitifully low for a nineteen year old, but he was now able to at least sit up in a chair without any aid other than getting there since he couldn't support his own weight as of yet, and remain awake for several hours before he became tired once again.  
  
It was on a sunny afternoon almost two weeks later when Dumbledore came to see him and make a startling request, that he attend the order meeting that night, a meeting of the entire order because all who were out on missions had returned.  
  
After thinking it over for a moment, Harry had hesitantly agreed, worried about how he was to be received, since, as of yet, only a handful knew of his presence and the true story about what had happened. So, it was with much nervousness that he allowed Sirius to help him dress in plain black robes with a cloak, the hood of which was pulled securely over his head to hide his face in the shadows.  
  
With Sirius and Remus supporting him on either side once he was ready, they all touched a portkey that would take them to the entrance hall and once there, they entered the Great Hall slowly, and Harry could immediately feel the curious gazes of those already there on them as they made their way to the right hand table and the two older men helped him sit down before taking their own seats on either side of him.  
  
They waited in silence for several minutes before the others had arrived, nearly four hundred in all, and Dumbledore got to his feet and called the meeting to order. 


	12. Difficult Discussions

Chapter 12-Difficult Discussions  
  
"Thank you all for coming tonight, it is good to see so many of you well" began the aged headmaster and leader of the order "Now, this meeting is of special importance, for there are many issues we must discuss. But first, are there any new developments that must be reported?" he asked and surveyed the room.  
  
After a moments silence in which everyone looked toward their neighbor, a tall wizard with a mop of sandy hair atop his head cleared his throat and immediately all attention turned to him.  
  
"Mr. Nichols, what is the status of gaining support from those wizards in hiding in other countries?" he asked, and Harry realized for the first time that this war was not limited to their country, but instead spanned nearly the entire world, and judging by Dumbledore's words, the rest of the wizards were in hiding..  
  
"We haven't had much luck yet" he started in a thick Irish accent "Most of those hiding are well protected from outsiders, and none of those in my group have been able to locate the largest groups of them. We have been able to find only small pockets, mainly just survivors of attacks, only a few hundred wizards and witches total, counting the children, and all of them have been brought either here or to the other safe houses that are controlled by the order or our allies. We were wondering if anyone here had any ideas about ways to locate others" he finished with a glance around the hall.  
  
"Thank you, Jacob. If anyone else has ideas, please speak to Mr. Nichols following the meeting" he said and a moment later, another person stood, a short witch with graying hair and an exhausted expression on her face.  
  
"Madame Kirkham, how are things progressing in the hospital?" asked Dumbledore  
  
"Not well, Albus. We are running out of ingredients for most of the emergency potions and the majority of the muggle medicines are gone as well. The healers are all exhausted because of the low numbers of them compared to those injured. Even with the trainees, we number only about fifty in all, counting field medics and those stationed here. We need more people, I fear that if we have any more large scale attacks that we won't have enough people or supplies to treat the injured and we may loose them because of these shortages" she finished heavily.  
  
Dumbledore nodded and surveyed the room again, and another wizard stood, this one reporting on the shortage of aurors who had combat experience and could train the few new recruits that they had. After his report followed several similar ones from every branch of the magical world, and with each report, the faces of those gathered around the table became even more and more downcast and Harry realized more and more just how bad things had progressed during his captivity, until nearly two hours later, the reports were finished.  
  
"I know that things may seem bleak right now" began the headmaster, but he was interrupted by the first man who spoke.  
  
"With all due respect, sir, we are outnumbered nearly four to one now, how can we counter that kind of resistance? True, a large percentage of Voldemorts" he said, and Sirius could feel the tremor that ran through his godson at the mention of that name from his seat beside him "supporters are either wizards under the imperious curse, or muggles under it armed with guns, but they are enemies nonetheless, and what hope do we have to fight them?" he asked and several murmurs from around the room showed that he wasn't the only one to feel this way.  
  
"You bring up a good point, Jacob, but if we give up now, we have already lost this war. We must keep hope that we will be able to win, that is the only way that we can keep going in such a difficult time" said the old man, once again looking his age. "We must also remember, though, that we have had our fare share of victories these past months, such as the freeing of the prisoners in Azkaban" and again, a murmur of assent went through the crowd as many turned to look at those who were brought back home, sitting around the hall "It is this victory that I wish to speak of now" said and immediately, all eyes were once again focused on him and the entire hall was silent. "At our last meeting, I told you of two children who were taken out of the fortress along with the aurors and order members, Jessica, whom I am sure you have seen running around the castle, and a teenage boy who we had been unable to identify at our last meeting.  
  
This is the main reason I wanted to gather all of you together tonight, to discuss this boy who we have made a positive id of now. He is a former student of Hogwarts, whom was lost to us at the end of his fourth year when he was taken as a prisoner of Voldemorts, a prisoner that only the dark lord and his inner circle knew of. He was kept in the basement of Riddle manor for over a year, until the night it was taken by the order, but before we had secured the manor, he was transported to Azkaban where he was kept in a hidden cell in the presence of several dementors at all times unless he was being tortured by Voldemort or one of the others who knew he was there.  
  
Not even our spies in the dark lords ranks were aware of his presence there until two weeks ago when they were punished for allowing him to be taken, but as of yet, the death eaters are unaware of the fact that he is at Hogwarts, and once they realize this, I expect that they will attack the castle" he said and immediately, the hall erupted as near chaos overtook the members of the order, or at least those who didn't know who their guest was. Harry sat as still as stone in his seat, the only muscles moving being those of his hands as the words hit him, The castle could be attacked because he was there, the only stronghold of the light in this war could be taken just because of his presence. Sirius, Remus, Ron, Hermione, Ginny, Snape, Poppy, Draco, and the headmaster, though, just watched the scene before them until it started to calm slightly and a wizard near the back raised the question that they were all curious about.  
  
"Who is this boy that the dark lord would try so hard to get him back? And how do we know that we can trust him if they want him so badly that they would take on the castle to get him?" he asked and there was complete silence as they all awaited his answer. He quickly looked to Harry, who with the physical support of Sirius and Remus stood up slowly, and all noticed that the two men as well as a few others around the hall including the headmaster had drawn their wands and were holding them as though ready to curse anyone who moved.  
  
"Let me remind you that this boy has been held as a prisoner of Voldemorts for over five years without our knowledge, and has been subjected to tortures that we can only imagine during his time there. He knew nothing of what went on in the war other than what was told to him during his torture sessions, and until he was taken from Azkaban he hadn't been left to move about freely, instead remaining chained to a wall for four years. He was captured the night Voldemort was reborn and has just now returned" he warned, his voice lined with steel.  
  
Feeling the eyes of the entire hall upon him, Harry took a deep breath and with a shaking hand pushed the hood off his head. The hall was silent for several minutes as those present tried to figure out who this boy with shoulder length black hair, glasses, and a terribly thin complexion was until a witch sitting beside them gasped and her hand went to her mouth in shock.  
  
"Harry Potter?" she asked in a stunned voice that carried throughout the room, and closing his eyes, Harry nodded marginally, and with that assent, the hall erupted once again, but this time demanding an explanation.  
  
"Listen here!" shouted Dumbledore over the chaos, but the hall was only silenced when he shot several large sparks from his wand. "Now, I ask you to remember what I just told you, and I will explain the rest. Harry, you may sit down" he said and Harry weakly nodded as he returned to his seat, his head bowed "Yes, this is Harry Potter, but not the Harry Potter you have come to know and fear through the past years or the one that was killed a few short months ago. That was an imposter under the polyjuice potion and several appearance charms that was sent back to Hogwarts after Voldemort was reborn with the body of Cederic Diggory.  
  
Madame Pomfrey has verified his story according to his medical records, and I myself have questioned him under Vertiserum made by Professor Snape. He is telling the truth; of this I have no doubt. This is Harry Potter, he never betrayed any of us, and he never joined Voldemort.  
  
That was all done by the imposter who had each and every one of us fooled. For our mistakes and allowing him to remain a prisoner for so long, we own him our support in the rough time that lies before him" he finished to the now silent hall.  
  
"Now, as usual, you are bound by a magical contract not to repeat anything you have seen or heard here tonight. We will reconvene at nine o'clock tomorrow evening to continue this meeting, Have a good night and consider what I have said." He finished before walking over to the trio of men where he kneeled on the floor and looked Harry in the eye.  
  
"Harry, thank you for coming tonight. You will see that things will work out fine if given time. But for now, I think it best if you were to return to the hospital wing and get some sleep. I would like it if you came tomorrow night as well, and if you would join the order as a member of the high circle, if you are interested. You have just as much if not more of a right to be here as the rest of us" he added with a smile  
  
"Think about it, I don't need an answer right now. Have a good night and I will come see you tomorrow afternoon" he added before rising and gesturing for them to lead the way, and the four left the still stunned hall behind them.  
  
With much help from Sirius and Remus, Harry made it back to the hospital wing where he immediately collapsed onto his bed, every muscle trembling with the effort the short walk had taken and his head aching from the stress of the evening.  
  
"Harry" began Sirius hesitantly, but he was interrupted by his godson  
  
"Not now, Sirius, I just want to go to sleep" he said quietly as he rolled over onto his side with his back to the other two men  
  
"Ok, we'll see you in the morning then, sleep well" said Remus before Sirius could push the point and he drug his friend from the wing, leaving a wide awake Harry behind.  
  
After the customary exam by Madame Pomfrey, Harry was left in peace in the now dark hospital wing, left to his own thoughts that were stirring so violently that he was unable to even close his eyes for a short period. Several hours later, he heard the door creak as it was opened, and closing his eyes quickly, he feigned sleep so as not to be disturbed but he heard quiet footsteps approaching his bed nonetheless.  
  
"I know you're not asleep" said a soft voice and Harry immediately felt a small smile tug at his lips as he rolled over and came face to face with Jessica.  
  
"How did a little girl like you become so smart as to know I wasn't asleep?" he asked accusingly but with amusement shining through his eyes.  
  
"Because, you always drink your sleeping drink before you go to bed, but you didn't tonight" she responded promptly and his eyes immediately fell onto the full goblet of dreamless sleep potion which was still sitting on his bedside table.  
  
"I guess you're right. So, what are you doing up here at this time of night? Does the Headmaster know you're gone?" he asked and by her downcast eyes, he knew the answer of the last question.  
  
"I just wanted to see if you were awake, I never get to talk to anyone else from the bad place" she said quietly and Harry's heart immediately went out to the small girl and he scooted over to make room for her beside him on the bed.  
  
"Well Jessica, you can come talk to me anytime you need to, ok?" he said as she crawled up next to him and burrowed herself under the blankets.  
  
"Ok" she said quietly and for several minutes they sat in silence until her soft voice broke it "Are you cold?" she asked worriedly  
  
"Not really, why, are you?" he asked, bewildered by the strange question.  
  
"Then why are you shaking? Are you scared about something?" she asked curiously  
  
"I'm shaking because of what the bad men did to me, but I'll get better" he answered in as reassuring of a tone as he could muster, though he didn't believe his words himself.  
  
"Oh, why did the bad men hurt you?" she asked  
  
"Because they didn't like me very much" responded Harry honestly  
  
"Why?" she persisted  
  
"I'm not sure that is a story that you need to know right now, but maybe later" he answered, not wanting to go into it at the moment.  
  
"Ok, but why did they hurt mummy and daddy?" she asked instead  
  
"Because they are bad men who don't care about who they hurt, they just do it" he responded  
  
"But why didn't they shot the green light at me too? Why did they just take Mummy and Daddy? I wanted to go with them, but they wouldn't let me, they just laughed and said I would be grateful for what they did later. What were they talking about?" she asked as she turned her serious eyes toward the green one  
  
"They were just talking nonsense, like bad men have a tendency to do" said Harry  
  
"Oh, can I ask you a question?" she asked seriously  
  
"You just did, but you can ask me another one if you would like" he answered with a lopsided smile which disappeared almost at once when she voiced her question.  
  
"What happened to your eye?" she asked softly as she raised her small hand and placed it hesitantly on his face.  
  
Harry closed his eyes for a moment and took a deep breath, he owed it to Jessica to answer her questions, not only for being the one to essentially save his life, but also so that it might help her get over her own demons from Azkaban.  
  
"Are you sure you want to know?" he asked quietly, not meeting her gaze but instead looking at their clasped hands.  
  
"Yes, if you will tell me" she answered, sounding much older than seven as she said it.  
  
"Ok then. I was in my room, at the prison, you know, the one next to yours?" he asked and when she nodded, he continued "Well, this was probably just over a year ago, the bad men had come in and were really mad because the order, that's the big group that fights the bad men, had won a very important battle, I'm not sure where or how but I think it was the last one that our side had won. But anyways, they came into my cell and after cursing me and hitting me for a while; they grabbed a hold of my hair and pulled me as far as they could with my arms chained to the wall.  
  
By this point, I was far too weak to fight them and one of them pulled a knife out of his pocket and cut my chest with it. It hurt so bad that I could hardly breath, and the last thing I saw was one of them laughing as he pulled me even closer and put the knife right at my eye, then I guess I lost consciousness because when I woke up, I couldn't see anything to the right of me and I had a horrible headache and blood all over my face. I guess they had given me a potion, because my eye was completely healed, but I couldn't see out of it.  
  
Later they told me that they were tired of mudblood eyes starring at them accusingly every time they saw me, so they thought they would even the score a little and next time the order defeated them, they would take the rest of my vision away as punishment" he finished quietly as he looked down at the teary eyed child beside him "I shouldn't have told you that, it'll give you nightmares" he said hastily  
  
"No, I'm glad you did, it will make you feel better to tell someone, and since you don't want to tell anyone else, you can tell me so that you can feel better and I can tell you what happened to me so I can feel better" she answered softly, and he felt a little better about the burden he had just placed on her young shoulders.  
  
"Thank you, Jessica, but I think it's time we went to sleep, it is almost tomorrow and we both have busy days. Why don't you take a sip of this to help you fall asleep" he said as he gave her the goblet of dreamless sleep potion and she obediently took a sip and her eyes immediately got heavy.  
  
"Can I stay here?" she asked and Harry nodded with a smile on his face before he took a drink as well and laid down on the bed, wrapping his arms protectively around Jessica as she curled up beside him.  
  
Within minutes, both were sound asleep, oblivious to the presence of Ginny Weasley just outside the door who had heard the entire conversation. After peaking in to make sure all was well with the pair, she shut the door behind her and made her way toward the headmasters office to inform him that she had found Jessica and tell him about the conversation she had overheard. 


	13. What Lies Within the Broken

Chapter 13

The headmaster of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry was at that moment nearly frantic with worry. He had returned from the Order meeting and immediately put Jessica to bed before leaving to make his nightly rounds of the castle to check the wards before heading to bed himself. When he returned to his quarters though, and went to look in on Jessica it was to discover that the young girl was no longer in her bed and after a quick survey of the rest of the living area, he discovered that she was no where in their living quarters.

Moving to the fireplace, he threw a pinch of powder in and called Minerva, Severus, Ginny, Remus, Sirius, Ron and Hermione. After briefly informing them about what was going on, the seven of them began to scour the castle in search of the little girl with brown hair, all hoping against hope that she was just exploring and the death eaters hadn't decided to take her back and succeeded in doing so.

Ginny had first looked through the orphanage before making her way to the hospital wing where she heard quiet whispering coming from the direction of Harry's bed, and after listening quietly for several minutes, not wanting to interrupt the two, she waited until the hospital wing was silent before peaking into Harry's room. She checked to make sure that they were both indeed asleep and made her way toward the headmasters office.

When she arrived, it was to find the rest of those that had been searching for Jessica seated around the office with tense expressions lining their faces but at the sound of her entering, they all looked with hope in their eyes.

All of those in the castle and the inner circle of the order had become quite attached to the little blue eyed seven year old girl and were truly worried about her safety as well as her emotional well being. She reminded Ginny a lot of Harry in more than one respect, the biggest similarity though was that neither of them would talk about what they had been through at the hands of the death eaters during their captivity. Despite the best efforts of all of those who had had any contact with the two, neither were willing to discuss anything that had happened to them. Harry would clam up and refuse to talk at all, according to Sirius, if anyone mentioned anything that had happened at Azkaban or the Riddle house, and it was only worse when anyone looked at the scars that adorned the majority of his body. Jessica, on the other hand, would pretend like no one had said anything about the prison, and would instead began to talk adamantly about something else, weather it be quidditch, or spells, or teachers, but under no circumstances had she said anything about her parents or her captivity since she had been found in the cell at Azkaban. This was the main reason that Ginny had not interrupted the conversation that the two had been having, they both needed a confidant, and if they couldn't talk to anyone else, at least they could talk to each other about the horrors of their past.

"I found her" Ginny said quickly and as the others began to look around her as though they were looking for Jessica when she continued "She's fine, but I guess she wanted to see Harry and fell asleep with him in the hospital wing. I didn't want to disturb them so I left her there" she finished and there was a collective sigh of relief from those gathered.

"I think you ought to know what I heard them talking about though" she said hesitantly, wondering if she should really be telling them about the private conversation she had overheard, but in the end, she decided that it would be worse if they heard it from Jessica because of a nightmare or something else, and although this was unlikely, she wanted them to be prepared just in case. With this being decided, she related the facts of the conversation to the others, and at the end, there were several pairs of concerned eyes looking anywhere but at one another for several minutes until Severus spoke up.

"That must have happened just after the first Hogesmede raid, nearly a year ago" he said quietly, being the only one that had analyzed the timeline instead of the events, thus picking up on something that no one else had until a certain red head spoke up.

"And here I was thinking that us losing all of the battles since was a bad thing. Could someone please define irony?" asked Ron in a very dejected tone of voice

"Well, there is nothing that we can do now except to try our best to help Harry if he asks for it" said the headmaster even though he wished with all of his heart that that weren't true, that he, with all of his powers, could just wave his wand and put things back how they were supposed to be. Harry as a normal nineteen year old boy out in the world for the first time without the guidance of his parents instead of this disaster which had been his life since he was a year old. He couldn't do that though, it was impossible and he just had to admit that and focus on the two children that needed his help right now in overcoming their own experiences. "We had better all head to bed, classes will be starting in a few hours and we will all have a late night tomorrow as well. Thank you all for your help tonight" he finished and as one, those around his office stood and made their way out and to their own rooms to sleep as long as they could while he headed toward the fireplace and contacted Madame Pomfrey to tell her about her overnight guest and let her know that he would be by before breakfast to pick Jessica up before he went to bed himself.

The next morning, Harry awoke with a start. There was a very unusual weight on his left arm, and a strange warmth against his side. Moving slowly, he opened his eyes and looked to his left only to get a face full of dark brown hair. After a moment's confusion, he remembered the previous night and sighed heavily. He really shouldn't have told the young girl about his own experiences like that. It was bad enough that he had to live with the nightmares, but now he had forced his horrific memories on an innocent child. Before he continued that train of thought any further, the small form beside him moaned softly and began to shake slightly. Thinking that she was cold, he pulled the spare blanket from the foot of the bed and was about to cover the child with it until he heard her begin to speak softly "Mummy, daddy no…please come back" she whispered and at once, he knew that the dreamless sleep potion had worn off and she was caught up in a nightmare of her own. Not quite sure what to do, he did the first thing that came to mind and gathered the girl close to himself and began to rock her gently back and forth and whispered softly in her ear.

"Shh Jessica, it's alright, I'm here" he repeated over and over to her until several minutes later he felt her head tilt up until his gaze was met with tear filled blue eyes.

"Harry?" she asked in confusion

"Yes?" he said quietly as he looked at the child in his arms

"Why are you in my bedroom?" she asked sleepily

"I'm not, you're in mine" he said with a small smile on his face

"Oh" she said and they sat in silence for several minutes until she spoke up again "Harry?" and at his nod she continued "Why did they take my mum and dad away?"

"Well, the people that took your parents and my parents away are very bad and they take pleasure in hurting others" he said, and despite her young age, she seemed to understand not only what he was saying, but what he wasn't saying as well.

"Where are they now?"

"Well, they are in heaven, watching over us and making sure we get well and are happy, and they will be there waiting for us many years from now when it is our time to join them" he responded and at her nod, they lapsed back into silence until she broke it again.

"Are you feeling better now?" she asked, and thrown off by the random question he took a moment longer to answer.

"Yes, I'm feeling much better, why?"

"Well, grandpa Albus showed me pictures of you flying on a broom and I was wondering if you would teach me how to. My daddy said he would get me my first broom when I turned seven…" she said but abruptly stopped that train of thought and looked to Harry with hopeful eyes.

Again, he felt a wave of sympathy for the young girl and despite his own problems, he wanted to do all he could to help the child, to prevent her from growing up as he had, feeling unloved and unwanted. "Well, I can't take you flying right now, but as soon as Madame Pomfrey says that I can, I promise to teach you how to fly" he said with a smile on his face.

"You promise?"

"Yes, and I always keep my promises"

After that was said, she relaxed against his chest before she spoke up again "Harry, I had a nightmare last night" she all but whispered into his pajama shirt. At his gentle squeeze she continued "I was at home with my mum and dad, we were in the kitchen eating cake and ice cream for my birthday and someone knocked on the door. Dad answered it and I heard him scream and then I saw the bad men, they shot a bright light at my mummy and me and I fell asleep. When I woke up, I was in the dark room with my mum and dad. They promised that we would be ok, and that they would protect me. Mummy told me that she would get me a puppy when we got home and dad told me that he would show me how to fly on my new broom. We left home before I could open my presents, but he told me he bought me a broom for my birthday while we were in the dark room. We were there for one month and the only person we saw was a funny looking creature that mum said was a house elf. Mum scratched marks on the wall every time daddy's watch said it was midnight. Daddy gave me his watch and taught me how to tell time with it while we were there. The elf brought us food every day and that was it all, but almost every day we heard the bad men walk to our door and say the secret word and go inside the hidden door. They were always laughing while they were in there and yelled all kinds of stuff, and sometimes, we would hear you talk, but not very often. Then, one day, the bad men came in and daddy grabbed me and told me and mum to stay behind him, but he fell down when a green light hit him and then it hit mummy too and I was all alone with the bad men. I started to cry and tried to wake them up, but the bad men said they would never wake up and I should thank them because now I would have a proper upbringing and would be better off for it. When they left, they took mum and dad with them and I only saw the silly elf until twenty-two days later, when Uncle Remus and Uncle Sirius rescued me" she finished in a small voice that reminded him of just how young she really was, despite the brave front she put up.

"Well, all that matters now is that you are here and you're safe" he told the girl, giving her shoulders a gentle squeeze to reassure her.

"But what if the bad men come back and try to hurt us again?" she asked, both fear and concern shining in her bright blue eyes.

"If they do, I promise that your Grandpa Albus will protect you at all costs, and so will I" he vowed.

"But who will protect you?" she asked, but they were both spared the answer to that most awkward question by the sound of footsteps approaching his room in the hospital wing. Looking up, they were not surprised to see Madame Pomfrey enter the door carrying a tray laden with vials of potions.

"Good morning Mr. Potter, Miss. Rice" she said with a smile on her usually stern face as the headmaster entered the room as well.

"Good morning children, I hope you both slept well" and at Jessica's smiling face and Harry's small nod, he continued "Jessica, why don't we get you back to your room so you can get ready for breakfast and so Harry can get cleaned up himself" he suggested.

"All right Grandpa Albus!" she exclaimed happily as she gave Harry one last quick hug before bounding out of the bed and racing up to grab her 'Grandpa's' hand to lead him out of the room "Can we go see the owl's today?" she could be heard asking as the door closed behind the pair.

As soon as they were gone, the nurse approached the bed and handed Harry a series of a half dozen potions to take, each worse tasting than the previous before she began to scan him with her wand, the sight of the wooden stick causing him to flinch out of habit, but the nurse didn't mention it to him, instead, asking him to unbutton his shirt so she could examine the scars on his torso. With his head bowed in shame and embarrassment, he complied with his shaking hands and allowed her to do her work. Even though she wouldn't get rid of the scars with magic without overloading his system, she was able to start putting a very mild salve on them that would hopefully cause them to fade over time. Once she was done, he pulled his shirt back on and waited for her to finish making notes on a piece of parchment on the table at the foot of his bed.

"Ok, Mr. Potter, all appears fine this morning. If it's alright with you, this evening I will give you a potion Professor Snape has come up with that will hopefully reverse some of the nerve damage in your muscles. I'm afraid that as of yet, there is nothing that will reverse it completely, but hopefully it can be managed a little. Now, how are you feeling this morning? Honestly" she added as an afterthought.

Knowing that he couldn't lie to the woman, he took a deep breath and answered in a very quiet voice "Tired, weak, and sore" he said.

"Ok, well, the potions I gave you included a pain killer and an energy booster, so, why don't you eat some breakfast and try to take a nap before the order meeting. I'll be back in a few hours with your next dose of potions" she said with a small smile.

"Thanks Madame Pomfrey" he said honestly as she left the room and returned with a tray of food before making her way into the public area of the hospital wing.

Harry still found eating particularly difficult, especially the eggs that were served as part of his breakfast, so after several minutes of the food falling off the fork, he gave up in frustration and settled for eating a slice of toast and drinking his pumpkin juice, holding it carefully with both hands as to keep it from spilling on his lap.

After finishing breakfast, he set the tray back on his bedside table and was about to start pondering what he should do today when he heard a heavy pair of boots approaching his room and after a moment of nervousness about who would be coming to see him, he relaxed as the form of his godfather came through the door. Upon seeing him awake, Sirius smiled and Harry responded with a small smile of his own.

"How are you feeling this morning?" asked his godfather with a strange glint in his eye.

"Better" responded Harry quietly, slightly worried about the look he was receiving.

"I bet you do" he said with a small smirk.

Sirius' tone and the look on his face were all it took to push Harry over the precipice that he was always teetering on the edge of. His brain went completely numb as he blocked out everything around him. His entire body tensed and his eyes glazed over as they stared unblinkingly ahead, completely missing his godfathers next sentence.

"I'd feel better too if I had spent the night with a beautiful brunette in bed with me" he said in a joking tone, his back turned to his godson as he pulled several small objects from his pocket and returned them to their proper size, revealing a stack of new robes and several books which he set on the bedside table after vanishing the breakfast tray. "I must say, your young friend had the entire castle turned upside down when she disappeared. Of course, now that I think about it, your room should have been the first place we looked, but as they say, common sense is the first thing that is taken by age. Anyway, I'm rambling…" but he abruptly cut himself off when he looked at his godson again "Harry?" he said quietly, concern etched on his face and laced through his words "Harry" he repeated a bit more forcefully as he leaned over the edge of the bed and cautiously reached out to grasp his godsons shoulder to pull him back into the present and out of whatever nightmare had him trapped again, but what happened next was something no one was prepared for. As soon as his hand grasped the bony shoulder, he felt extreme pain for a split second before he was thrown across the room and into the wall next to the still open door, the impact of his head on the wall causing his vision to waver for a moment before he focused on his godson again "Harry" he said quietly trying to ignore the blackness along the edges of his visions and at once, the green gaze was turned to him.

The green eye that had been so dull since he had returned was glowing an eerie emerald color, but the most surprising was that BOTH of his eyes were glowing brightly enough that they would have been easily visible even in the darkest of places. But, just as suddenly as the eyes were upon him, Harry's face was contorted in horror for a split second before his entire body went slack and he fell like a lifeless doll off the far side of the bed, just as the blackness overtook Sirius' vision and he lost consciousness and slumped over where he had landed, a small trail of blood smeared down the wall where his head had hit it. The entire room was left in complete silence.

Poppy Pomfrey had long ago stopped asking questions about anything that concerned the son of the late James and Lily Potter, because it never failed, the more she asked herself about the boy, the more questions she had, all with answers that were quite out of her reach. It was due to this fact that she was able to accept him for who he was a lot quicker than others once the medical evidence was presented, and so she was able to treat him as she always had while he had been a student, despite the fact that she had not been in the boys presence for over five years. But inside, she was heartbroken, Harry had always been such a strong child, never letting anything get him down despite all he had been through. He had come in to her hospital wing seriously injured on more than one occasion during his Hogwarts years, but he still retained the spark in his eyes that showed he would never stop fighting, but now it was gone. His once brilliant emerald eyes were dull and defeated, and his body and spirit broken, and despite her best efforts, she feared that he would never truly fully recover from this latest challenge. During the previous war, as well as the current one, Poppy had seen her fair share of gravely injured patients, the Dark Lord was ruthless and his followers were just a blood thirsty and cruel as their master, thus leaving a path of death, destruction, and broken people in their wake, but despite her vast experience with their victims in the past, she had never encountered anyone in the shape that Harry was currently in, even now, several weeks after his rescue from Azkaban he was still terribly emaciated and his injuries were so numerous that healing was taking longer than normal, even with magic.

Perhaps the thing that baffled her the most though, was the fact that Harry was alive at all after five years in the captivity of the most evil wizard alive and his followers. The dark lord was not known for sparing his enemies, but Harry had been kept alive for over five years, which baffled her to no end. True, had polyjuice potion been used for the imposter to change into Harry's form, it would have been necessary for him to be kept alive, but due to Draco's investigations, it had been discovered that the imposter had changed his form using only muggle methods. Apparently, over the course of several months leading up to the third task, he had undergone a series of muggle surgeries in order to make himself look identical to Harry, altering everything from the structure of his face to the tell tale scar on his forehead, making it impossible for his identity to be revealed by magic. In fact, the only spell cast had been one to change the imposters voice to the same tone as Harry's. Apparently, the only changes that weren't permanent was the hair which had been dyed black, and the eye color which had been changed using colored contact lenses. The death eater who had impersonated Harry was actually a boy who had graduated from Durmstrung the year before the triwizard tournament and had been recruited for the job during the summer following Pettigrew's escape, allowing for nearly a year of preparations before the switch had been made. A man by the unassuming name of Edmond Prescott had essentially destroyed all hope in the wizarding world that the light would be victorious at the end of this terrible war. But now, hope had been rekindled, if only the true Harry Potter was not lost to them, then maybe things could begin to change.

It was with this thought in mind that she gathered up the tray of potions and proceeded into the private room to check on her charge. Come to think of it, the entire ward had been strangely quiet for some time now, which was surprising since Sirius Black had been in with his godson for over an hour now and was not known to be a quiet man, but as soon as she entered the room, she realized why. Sirius was lying against the wall just inside the door, unconscious with a thin stream of blood running down his neck from a wound on his head, and his left hand looked like it had received a severe burn. Shocked, she dropped the tray and looked to the bed only to find it empty. Terrified, she frantically searched around the bed and found her charge lying on his stomach on the far side, clammy and pale, his breaths coming in uneven gasps. For a moment, she completely forgot her training in her terror about what had happened in the room while she had been just outside, but after the brief moment, she gathered her thoughts and tried to figure out what to do next.

Clearly, both of them were injured, but her biggest concern now was to try and figure out what exactly had happened to injure them, and that required leaving them for a moment. Quickly, she ran from the room back to her office where she threw a handful of powder into the fire and yelled through the swirling flames "Albus, I need you immediately!" and an instant later, the aged headmaster appeared through the swirling flames.

"Poppy, what has happened?" he asked as she turned on her heal and began to gather up an armload of various potions

"I'm not entirely sure, Mr. Black went in to visit Harry about an hour ago, and I was going to give him his noontime potions, but something happened" she said in a flustered tone, and upon entering the room, the headmaster saw what had her so upset. Immediately, he conjured another bed and levitated the unconscious form of Sirius onto it before turning his wand to Harry and returning him to his own bed.

"What do you need me to do Poppy?" he asked, all business in his tone.

"Cast a diagnostic spell on Black and treat him accordingly while I try and figure out what Potter has done to himself this time" she said. Few knew of it, but Albus Dumbledore had had training as a field medic at the beginning of the war against Grindewald and was thus a capable healer, though not quiet as adept at Pomfrey, but he could easily handle the task of at least starting the healing process on the professor while Poppy handled the far more difficult task of healing Harry.

After muttering a spell under his breath, the list of injuries appeared in his mind, a fracture to the back of the skull, and third degree burns on the palm of his left hand. Quickly, he summoned two potions to himself and opening the mans mouth, he first poured a pain killing potion down his throat followed by a blood replenishing potion. He then rolled Sirius over and cast a series of spells to the clearly visible cut on the back of his head, and in a matter of moments, the blood flow had stopped and the skin had knitted itself back together. He next turned his attention to the severely burned hand. Taking another potion, he carefully spread a thick orange salve over the raw flesh before magically wrapping the hand with bandages. After checking Sirius one more time, and confirming that he had done all he could for the time being, he turned to Poppy to see the mediwitch looking even more flustered than she had at the beginning of the ordeal.

"Poppy, how is he?" he asked as he stepped up to the bedside.

"I honestly have no idea what happened" she said as she again waved her wand over the prone form on the bed "As far as I can tell, he experienced a severe magical surge of some kind that completely overloaded his system, but that's not the strangest part." And at his confused look, she continued "Whatever that surge was, it caused several of the injuries that I have been unable to heal to disappear"

"What do you mean Poppy?" he asked, confusion evident in his voice

"Well, his right knee, for example, had been shattered at some point, and I had been able to heal the bone for the most part, but it was still very fragile, and due to the severe scaring, he would always have a limp and be in pain from it if he overexerted himself. But now, the bone is just a strong as it has ever been, and the scarring has disappeared completely, leaving his right leg just a strong as his left, and I am convinced that the limp has completely disappeared. Several of the severe scars on his lungs and heart from terrible bruising and punctures have also disappeared, leaving the organs healthy, and with strengthening exercises and time, they will be able to be as strong as they were before he was taken. The most impressive thing though, is that his vision is now 20/20, in BOTH eyes, which is extraordinary, since it was not that way even before his captivity. I just can't explain it, Albus" she finished and before they could continue the discussion further, a groan from the next bed brought their attention to the awakening Sirius Black.

"Sirius, how are you feeling?" asked the headmaster as they reached the side of his bed.

"Like I've been run over by a herd of hippogriffs" he muttered with a groan before his eyes snapped open and he began to look frantically around "Harry!" he exclaimed

"Calm down Mr. Black, he's fine" said the mediwitch

"What happened? I was talking to him and he seemed to be so distracted, I just grabbed his shoulder to get his attention and the next thing I knew was he was looking at me and I was on the floor" he said, confusion evident on his face "But there was something strange about the way he was looking at me, like he didn't even see me, but through me" he added, more to himself than to anyone else "What happened?" he asked again.

"We're not entirely sure, all we know is that he experienced a severe magical surge of some sort that healed several of his injuries that were impossible for me to take care of, but it also knocked him out, the surge was just too much for him to handle right now. He'll be ok though, he just needs some time to rest" she said, and upon hearing her words, Sirius relaxed into the pillows on his bed, his eyes falling to his bandaged hand.

"What happened to my hand?" he asked

"You ended up with a very severe burn somehow, I'm guessing that it happened when you touched Harry" and at his nod, the headmaster continued "Interesting" he muttered

"What's interesting, Albus?" he asked, the conversation now having his full interest

"I've had the suspicion for a long time that Harry may have powers that have not manifested yet, and maybe with this surge, they are starting to show themselves" he said, the words just frustrating Sirius even more.

"Albus, stop talking in riddles and just tell me what's going on with my godson" he snapped

"Sirius, you are aware that every witch and wizard had a magical signature that is just as unique as their fingerprint" and Sirius nodded for him to continue "Well, what makes that signature unique is the capacity to perform certain spells with little or no difficulty, just as you were able to achieve the animagus training with far less difficulty than most. Well, as you undoubtedly know, Harry has his own strong areas, the strongest being Defense Against the Dark Arts, but I have long suspected that he has some elemental abilities as well, but we will not know for sure until he awakens and becomes strong enough to resume his magical education. Get some rest Sirius, we will reschedule the order meeting for tomorrow morning at nine so you and Harry can be present." He finished abruptly as he turned to leave the hospital wing, a contemplative expression upon his face. In his wake, he left an ex-convict that was even more confused than he had been upon waking up.


	14. Unexpected Perspective

Chapter 14-Unexpected Perspective

Harry awakened late in the afternoon with a killer headache that for once had absolutely nothing to do with his scar. With a groan, he forced his eyes open and saw that he was alone for now, or so he thought. From the bed next to him came the sound of quiet breathing and the occasional sound of a quill scratching on parchment. Curious, he turned his head to the sound and saw his godfather concentrating intently and writing something, but, he also noticed that his left hand was encased in a heavy bandage of some sort.

"Sirius, what happened?" he asked quietly and had circumstances been different, he might have laughed as Sirius spilled the pot of ink creating a large black spot on the pristine white sheets.

"Merlin, Poppy is going to kill me!" he wined as he tried in vain to vanish the ink from his bed "Why didn't I pay more attention to cleaning charms" he groaned before finally giving up and smiling at his godson "So, how are you feeling?" he asked

"Fine" said Harry out of habit before he realized that he indeed did feel better than he had in a long time, and not only that, but he realized with a shock that he was able to clearly see his godfather, out of both eyes and without his glasses. "What happened to me?" he asked in confusion and upon seeing the predawn light outside the large windows he asked "How long was I asleep?"

"Well, for starters, you have been unconscious for almost a day, I was starting to get worried and as for what happened to you, I have no idea, and trust me, trying to get answers from Albus just confused me even more, perhaps you'll have better luck" said Sirius, a frustrated look on his face.

"What happened to you? Why is your hand bandaged?" asked Harry in a small voice, dreading the answer

"Well, according to the headmaster, you had some sort of a magical surge, and stupid me, I tried to shake you out of it" said Sirius with a grim smile on his face.

"I hurt you? I'm so sorry Sirius, I didn't mean to" said Harry quickly, a horrified look upon his face, his voice full of fear that he would loose the most important person in the world to him.

"Don't be, you had absolutely no control over what happened, and I should have known better than to try to touch a wizard who obviously wasn't paying attention, I'm just lucky it was you and not Moody, he probably would have sent me into a coma for months" said Sirius with a smile.

The pair sat in silence for several moments, Sirius trying to decipher the expression on Harry's normally stoic face, and Harry trying to remember anything he could from the events of the previous morning.

"So, really, how are you feeling?" asked Sirius finally

"Truthfully, much better, but how is this possible? I mean, I can see you clearly, _really_ see you, and I don't even have my glasses on. I asked Hermione if there was a spell to correct bad vision and she said there wasn't, besides, Madame Pomfrey said that I would never be able to use my eye after…after" he said, unable to say the words that were in his mind.

"Well, apparently, the magical surge you had somehow managed to heal several of the internal injuries that Poppy thought would be permanent, like your knee. Does it still hurt?" he asked suddenly

Confused, Harry shifted his right leg beneath the heavy blankets, and was shocked when the familiar stab of pain that radiated from his hip to his toes was absent and his leg just felt weak and tired, but for the first time in longer than he could remember, it was free of pain.

Noticing the expression on his godson's face, Sirius smiled "I thought so" he said quietly as he returned to writing on the parchment that was spread across his legs and Harry took his cue that their conversation about what had happened would have to wait until later.

Harry watched him for several minutes before speaking up again "What are you doing?" he asked, genuinely curious. Even though they had only spent a short time together since meeting, Harry knew for a fact that his godfather was not a man who was studious or serious unless he was working on something extremely important.

"Hm? Oh, the order meeting was rescheduled for this morning at nine and I have a report to make on how best to protect Diagon Alley and the Hogwarts express for the beginning of the school year"

"It's September?"

"Not quite yet, it's the 27th of August, school starts next week"

"And you're a professor?"

"Yes, Remus and I teach Defense Against the Dark Arts together, as you know, it's the most important class the students take right now, so it falls to the two of us to protect the students"

"So, you come up with the plans, and the order follows them?"

"Kind of, the order reviews the plans and usually only after several hours of debate, with everyone adding their own suggestions, we come up with a final plan than more or less pleases all involved and the order with the aurors follow the plans and we hope for the best"

"How long have you been doing this?"

"Only about a year now, the head of the defense department used to do it but he was killed in a raid so it fell to the order. Usually Remus helps but last night was the full moon so he's in his rooms recuperating"

Harry fell silent in thought and Sirius continued to work on the parchment until a muttered curse broke the silence "Bloody hell!"

"What is it?" asked Harry, immediately alert to his surroundings

"Oh nothing, I just can't get this to work out properly"

"Anything I could help with?"

"Nah, just an old mans troubles, don't worry"

"Can I try?" asked Harry hesitantly

Sirius looked at his godson, and for the first time since being reunited, they met each others eyes and held the gaze for several minutes, until the intensity of the green eyes caused Sirius to look away.

"Okay" he said as he got out of his own bed and awkwardly pulled a chair up to Harry's bedside and spread the parchment out between them. Upon it was drawn out a very elaborate map of Diagon Alley, complete with the names of shops and small blue stars labeled with the names of those whom Harry assumed were order members, several of which Harry recognized and many he did not. Intermixed with the order members were red stars labeled with other names that Harry didn't recognize, and finally, there were a handful of purple stars spread out evenly among the others, and a larger percentage of these names Harry did recognize, nearly half, among them were Sirius Black, Ron Weasley, and Hermione Granger. Each group had five members surrounding a group of fifteen to twenty unmarked black dots.

"Alright, the blue are order members, the red are aurors, and the purple are either current aurors of former who are in the order and the black are students and parents. Each group of guards will be waiting in the Leaky Cauldron and as soon as there is a complete group of students and their parents they will depart to get the needed supplies before being escorted back to the pub to depart through floo or going back to muggle London. While inside the shops, the guards will be positioned at the doors to act as a lookout for danger. Now, what I'm having trouble with though is separating everyone up equally so each group of people has a variety of strengths. For instance, I don't want one group to have four people who can all throw off the imperious curse, and another group that has no one that can throw it off, but I'm having trouble making each group equal and not leaving one group weak"

Nodding his head, Harry looked over the parchment, his brow furrowing in concentration for nearly a quarter of an hour before he spoke up.

"I see where you are having trouble, if you split up the guard groups even further, you will weaken the guard to the point that it will be useless, they would be defenseless"

"Yes, but our numbers are so stretched as it is due to losses and those who are out on long term missions that we somehow have to make due with those we have"

"How do you decide what students and parents are in what group?"

"We don't, as soon as we have enough people for a full group, we send them out for fear that if we linger to long, the pub will be attacked"

"Well, perhaps you could stager their arrival time throughout the day, making it so that you can station guards here, here, here, and here" he said while pointing to the roofs of several different shops "That way you have people positioned in areas that have full view of the alley and you can see an attack before it happens"

"But we have no guards to spare" said Sirius

"You would if you staggered the arrivals of the students, that way, one group of guards would have time to take at least two separate groups while the others could watch the alley. Also, if you decide when people arrive, you could have the muggleborns and first years with the older students and their parents for added protection"

"You're right, I think that would work out better, but who should be with the students, and who should be stationed at the shops?"

"Let's see, Neville, Cho, and Hannah are all good at offence, but better at defense, yet not good enough at either to be put together, you need to split them up. Put Neville with Andrews, Cho with Jacobs, and Hannah with Ron" he said, matching the names he had learned at the order meeting with the faces he had seen in his visions throughout the years. "Now, this woman, Amy Barthow, who is she?" he asked his godfather.

"She's been in the order for almost four years, a graduate of Beaubatons. She worked in the department of magical cooperation before the ministry fell. She was out on a mission until two days ago so you didn't see her at the meeting"

"What does she look like?"

"Tall, thin, shoulder length dark brown hair" said Sirius, his curiosity peaked by his godsons sure words and ability to think up strategies.

"Does she have a scar on her left hand, across the back of it?" asked Harry his eyes looking somewhere beyond the confines of the hospital wing.

Shocked, Sirius couldn't say anything for a moment but finally he was able to stutter out a reply "Ye..yeah, she does. She was hit by a cutting curse in a battle a couple years ago, we didn't think she'd be able to use the hand again, and to this day she can't even grip anything with it. How did you know that?"

"Never mind, now, she is very good with offensive spells but her defense is touch and go, put her with Hermione on the roof of the robe shop. Who is Jake Richards?"

"Hogwarts graduate about fifteen years ago. Short man with sandy colored hair and glasses, he always has a thick beard like a goat" said Sirius with a grin.

"Ok, now, he has good defensive skills, put him with Neville and Andrews, and with them, lets send Padme and lets see" he said while surveying the parchment "Madame Bones. There, now that is one group done. We probably need a total of only five groups, and the rest of the aurors and order members can be stationed around as extra security" he said and he began to deconstruct, analyze, and reconstruct the rest of the guards until, two hours later, they had a strategy that would pass the inspection of even Mad eye. Total, there were five guard groups to escort students and a further sixty people stationed strategically around the alley, on rooftops and on the street to watch for danger.

After finishing with that parchment, Sirius excitedly grabbed the parchment with the drawing of platform 9 ¾ and the Hogwarts express on it as well as the Hogesmede station and the path to Hogwarts and he and Harry spent another hour and a half determining who would ride on the train, who would fly above it on broomsticks, who would be stationed where at each of the train stations, and who would go where on the way to the castle.

"Well, Harry, I must admit that I'm surprised, it seems that your skills at defense are more varied than anyone has given you credit for. I'm sorry but you have just volunteered to help Remus and myself plan the battle strategies from now on" he said with a smile

"Sirius, can we please not tell anyone that I helped with those, I don't want even more attention"

"Okay if you insist, but you do deserve the credit for this" he said as he looked at his watch "Oh Merlin, we only have fifteen minutes until the meeting starts" and he jumped to his feet and pulled his robe over his head before turning back to see an amused look on his godson's face "what?"

"Don't you think you should change out of your pajamas before putting your robe on?" asked Harry innocently

"Not a word" said Sirius as he turned red and removed the robe before digging the cloths out of the chair next to his own bed.

While he was getting dressed, Harry pushed the blankets off his own lap and reached for the slacks and shirt on the bedside table as he slowly dangled his legs over the edge of the bed and pulled his pajama shirt over his head.

What Harry didn't realize was that Sirius was watching him carefully and grimaced violently when his back was revealed to the older man. Even though the bruising had disappeared over the weeks since his return, the plethora of scars that adorned his entire upper body were still plainly visible, a shocking red in contrast to the still too pale skin. The other sight that caused him to be sick was the sight of his horribly prominent backbone as well as his shoulder blades and hip bones. Once he had the shirt on, he shakily stood and while firmly gripping the foot of the bed changed into the black slacks before pulling the robe over his shoulder followed by the thick cloak. He then sat back down and tried to reach for the boots that were under the foot of the bed but a pain filled expression crossed his face when he bent over and Sirius decided it was time to interfere.

"Here" he said gently as he picked up the boots and helped Harry into them before tying them securely.

"I'm sick of being so weak" muttered Harry under his breath, refusing to look as his godfather tied his shoes.

"Hey, you'll get there, it just takes time. You should have seen me after I escaped, I was hopeless. But in time I got back to my old self, and you will too, just don't try to rush things. Now come on, lets go" he said as he helped Harry to his feet and pulled a quill off the table and held it out to him.

"Actually Sirius, could we walk?" he asked timidly, his eyes focused on the quill in his godfather's hand.

"Are you sure you're up for it?"

"I think so"

"Ok then, let's walk" and with a small smile, Harry pulled his hood up over his head, casting his face into shadow and with that, they began the slow process of walking down to the great hall. It took them nearly thirty minutes to make the trek, but they made it, Harry gripping Sirius' arm the entire time and stopping several times to catch his breath and rest so that he was able to continue the long walk.

When they reached the great hall, Sirius quietly opened the door and helped Harry through it and as they shut the door, they realized that the entire hall was starring at them in silence.

"How nice of you to join us, Mr. Black" said the headmaster with a slight twinkle in his eye

"I know, so now that I'm here, you may start the meeting" he said as he flashed his trademark grin at the assembly and moved toward the two empty seats on the right side of the table and helped Harry sit before doing so himself.

"Now, as I was saying, the recent silence of the deatheaters and Voldemort makes me believe that they are planning something big so we must keep on our guard at all times. Now, Sirius, have you come up with a plan for the safety of the students in Diagon Alley and on the train next week?"

"I think so Albus. Now here's the plan" he began before laying out the plan he and Harry, actually mostly Harry, had come up with. "And that's pretty much it" he finished up about ten minutes later.

"Well Sirius, I must say, I can't think of anything at all to change about that, can anyone else?" and when no one spoke up, he continued "Perhaps we should give you a concussion before you make up all the strategies" he said with a smile and Harry abruptly looked to his godfather.

"What concussion?" he asked accusingly, knowing for a fact that he had been the cause of that injury as well.

"Later" Sirius whispered back.

"Ok then, on Saturday, we will meet here at seven am and apparate to Diagon Alley and begin meeting the students at eight. Minerva, you will be in charge of dividing up the students and sending out letters to inform them of their scheduled times of arrival."

"Albus, the only thing that we couldn't figure out, was what to do about the students with suspected death eaters as parents" said Sirius quietly, hating to bring up that frightening point, but knowing he had to.

"Yes, that is a problem, but the only solution I can think of is to make sure that the families in question are staggered as much as possible. Now, onto other business, if the high circle would please gather your groups and hand out assignments for Saturday and we will reconvene here Saturday night to prepare for the students to return to the castle. Also, would Remus Lupin's group please report to Sirius Black for assignment" he added as an afterthought since Remus was sleeping off the effects of the full moon the previous night.

The hall was quickly filled with noise as everyone stood and made their way to their respective group leader and within a few minutes, Sirius was surrounded by nearly fifty witches and wizards, all of whom looked at Harry's still form with expressions ranging from strong apprehension, to fear, to distrust, and a few even showed pity and sympathy, but Harry ignored them all and diverted his attention around the hall to figure out who else were considered members of the order's high circle. The choices really didn't surprise him. There was Remus and Sirius, as well as Snape, McGonagall, Mr. Weasley, Mad Eye, and three others that Harry couldn't name but recognized their faces from his visions and knew that they were very capable and powerful.

Looking around, he saw that Hermione was in the group headed by a witch with curly black hair that was flecked with gray, Ron was in Snape's group, and Ginny was in Moody's group. Several others that he was in school with were spread out through all the groups, including Fred and George who were both in the large group Sirius was speaking to.

He quickly soon his mind wandering though, his thoughts ranging from the good time's spent in the great hall, such as winning the house cup in his first year, and the many feasts, to the not so pleasant times, such as the disastrous Yule ball. His mind then began to wander onto more dangerous territory, such as the night his name came out of the Goblet of Fire, and that memory led to the maze and the graveyard, his laughable attempts to dual with the most evil dark lord ever, and his shame in thinking he could win that fight.

"Alright, everyone understand their positions? Good, I'll see you Saturday then" said Sirius suddenly, drawing Harry out of his dangerous thoughts not a moment too soon to see the large group dispersing to the fireplace in the hall or toward the exit to head to the rooms they were using for the time, and after a few minutes the two of them were alone on their side of the table. In silence, Sirius stood and extended his hand toward Harry to help him up, but he caught sight of the twins who were tentatively approaching him from the left side "Harry?" whispered Sirius in concern.

"I'm fine" he replied equally as quietly before turning his focus to the pair now before him.

"Harry, it's good to see you mate" said George hesitantly, not at all like the mischievous twin Harry remembered. Fred echoed his statement before they fell silent, obviously not knowing what else to say so Harry decided to take the initiative and relieve their discomfort.

"You too" he replied, meeting their eyes each for a split second before struggling to his feet and nodding to Sirius who stood beside him and took his arm and activated the portkey before they both disappeared to the hospital wing. When the pair's feet hit the floor, Harry would have collapsed had it not been for his godfathers strong grip, and Sirius, feeling Harry's legs give out, quickly guided him backward until he literally fell onto the bed, his breathing ragged.

"Are you ok?" asked Sirius in concern "I knew we should have left earlier, that meeting was far to long for you right now, hell it was too long for me"

"I'm fine Sirius, I just don't care for portkeys anymore" responded Harry as he lay down on his bed obviously exhausted, his hands shaking worse than they had for several days and his face pale and clammy.

"Are you sure? You don't look too well"

"When have I looked well to begin with? Really, I'm fine, I just need a nap" responded Harry, his words slurring slightly in his exhaustion

"If you say so, go to sleep, you've had a long day so far. Don't forget what I said about those strategies though, you're stuck helping us from now on" said Sirius with a smile, and with a groan, Harry rolled over and was asleep in seconds.

Before he fell asleep though, Sirius swore he heard him mutter "Great, bloody homework already" and he found it hard not to laugh at how refreshing juvenile the comment sounded.

A/N: Yes another update within the same calendar year! Anyways, I received a very interesting review, and although I don't respond to individual reviews, I will for this one because oasis posed some very interesting questions and concerns so here goes:

No, this will be far from a super Harry story. Yes, as you can see, he has gained some different abilities that aren't quite normal but remember that the circumstances aren't normal either. For instance, the knowledge of everyone's strengths and weaknesses that showed up in this chapter are the direct result of sitting in a cell for five years seeing nothing but his abusers and the visions that, as will soon be discovered by those at Hogwarts, became far more detailed and intense than they had been before he was taken.

No, though there will be scenes between Harry and Ginny, it will most likely be just as friends, not romance. Remember that he was captured during his fourth year, and he didn't really notice Ginny as even a friend until the fifth book, and since this is clearly a/u, they still have to establish their friendship here before anything else can possibly happen.

Hope that eases your worries, thanks to all for the great reviews, let me know about this new chapter.


	15. Loss of Virtue

Chapter 15-Killer of Virtue

As soon as he saw that his charge was asleep, Sirius left the hospital wing for Remus' rooms to see how his last remaining friend was recuperating from the previous night.

After giving the password to the portrait guarding the fourth story quarters, he quietly entered the main room, not wishing to wake his friend if he was still asleep, but to his pleasure, Remus was sitting on a leather armchair in front of a roaring fireplace wearing a thick burgundy robe with a book spread across his knees.

"Hey Moony, how are you feeling?" he asked as he invited himself to sit down on the plush couch.

"Tired, but all in all not bad. How was the meeting?" he asked as he carefully marked his page and turned his full attention to Sirius, only now noticing the bandage on his hand "What happened to you?"

"Oh, the meeting was typical, just went over plans for this weekend, and this is no big deal, just a little burn" responded Sirius nonchalantly, obviously wanting to discuss something else he thought more important.

"Ok, we'll get back to that later, what's on your mind?" asked Remus, knowing when his friend was distracted almost before Sirius knew it himself.

"Harry" he said simply

"Obviously, but what about Harry? Is everything ok?" asked Remus in concern

"I think so, but he is defiantly an enigma" said Sirius, his brow furrowed in thought

"Well, we've known that since he was two weeks old, but what happened now?"

"Yesterday morning, I went to talk to him and he seemed really distracted, I tried to get his attention by grabbing his shoulder, but something happened and when I touched him, he burned me somehow and threw me across the room into the wall. When I woke up, Poppy and Albus were there, but all that I could get out of them was that somehow several of the injuries that he had that Poppy couldn't heal, like his eye and his right knee, were suddenly healed, and not only back to normal, but better, his vision is now 20/20 in both eyes. The only explanation that Albus had for this was that Harry might have some sort of elemental abilities, but that's all they would say" he finished in frustration.

"Well, that defiantly explains the distraction" said Remus "But that's not all, is it?" Some thought that it was strange how the friends seemed to know what each other was thinking, but after three decades of friendship, it was a wonder they _couldn't_ read each others thoughts.

"Not quite, this morning, I woke up early and was trying to finish the plans for Saturday when Harry woke up, but he was different, he actually looked me in the eye and talked like a nineteen year old would, without fear or apprehension. He asked me what I was working on and asked if he could help. I was doubtful at first that he was ready to take part in any aspect of the war, but he was extremely helpful with the plans. Somehow he knew the strengths and weaknesses of everyone in the order and how best they could be used for our needs. He was able to take my plans and completely reorganize them in a way that not even Moody could find anything to change about them. I'm just worried that he is trying to get involved too soon" he finished with a sigh.

"I can see why you're concerned" said Remus as the pair settled into silence to ponder their own thoughts for some time before Remus broke the companionable silence.

"I don't pretend to know everything there is to know about the different magical powers that have been discovered in the wizarding world, but how could elemental abilities cause Harry's injuries to heal?"

"What do you mean, Moony?"

"Well, however rare they have been, there have been several witches and wizards in the past who could control a specific element, Albus, for instance is an air elemental" he said but was cut off by Sirius

"How do you know that?" he asked suddenly

"Harry's third year, when you came to watch his quidditch match and the dementors came. Remember, Harry passed out and fell off his broom" he said and at Sirius' nod he continued "I was sitting next to Albus otherwise I would never have noticed, but when he saw Harry fall, he stood and waved his hand, causing a huge gust of air to sweep across the pitch and catch Harry before he hit the ground. Later, I asked him what spell he had cast that could manipulate the wind in such a manner, and he just smiled and said that he cast no spell, just called on the wind to catch Harry. I didn't understand at first, but later that night, I realized that he was an air elemental. I researched elementals and learned that there have been approximately four hundred reported in history, with 99 of them being either air elementals, like Albus, with the ability to manipulate the wind, or earth elementals like Professor Sprout and Neville Longbottom who have the ability to make plants grow"

"Neville is an elemental?" asked Sirius in shock "I mean, I know he is very talented in herbology, but I would never have guessed he had elemental abilities"

Remus just smiled before he continued "Clumsy as he may be, there was a reason that Frank and Alice were on the top of Voldemorts hit list. After hearing the prophecy, he did his own research and discovered the powers that run in the Longbottom family and thought that Neville could be a risk in the future because of it, but, he found James and Lily before Frank and Alice and never killed Neville like he wanted"

"But what about Harry? None of those abilities run in the Potter line. True, they have always been very strong magically, but I haven't heard about any of them having elemental abilities"

"Because none of the Potters have had those powers, but it isn't just genetics that determines who will be an elemental and who won't"

"What else could cause those powers then?"

"Life experiences have accounted for 1 of the elementals that have been recorded, and you know as well as I do that Harry has had more than his far share of life experiences" he finished

"What ability does he have? Air or earth?" asked Sirius in confusion

"Neither, I'm willing to bet everything I own that Harry is a fire elemental" he said, his eyes locked with the blue eyes of his only remaining best friend.

"What?" asked Sirius, his voice unnaturally quiet

"I said that Harry is a fire elemental"

"How is that possible? I thought fire was completely uncontrollable?"

"It is, uncontrollable and unpredictable. Fire, unlike air and earth, is not always present, but in an instant it can consume everything. It feeds off of the other elements, using oxygen to grow and using the products of the earth as kindling"

"How did Harry become a fire elemental though? It's unheard of" said Sirius in disbelief

"Not quite, there was one other in 1547 in Italy. A man who came home to fine his wife and four children murdered by the muggles in the village. Apparently, he was so distraught and enraged that he held out his hand to those who had killed his family, his wand forgotten, and at once, fire consumed them and they were killed before he allowed the flames to overtake himself and was gone as well. He was the only reported fire elemental, though there were two others who had similar tales, but like the Italian man, they died as soon as they had shown their powers. I stumbled across the stories when I was researching elementals and they sort of stuck" he added when he saw Sirius' disbelieving face that he had remembered such a trivial tale.

"How can you be so certain that Harry is a fire elemental, though? Why not earth or air?"

"Look at your hand" was all he said as answer.

Sirius looked curiously at his hand and it hit him at once. All magic could become unstable and unpredictable when a wizard was startled or frightened. Both of which Harry was feeling when he had grabbed his shoulder the previous day. If what Remus said was true, he was lucky he hadn't been incinerated because of his carelessness. Another thought then struck his already rapidly spinning mind and he groaned out loud.

"How are we going to tell Harry? All he wants is to be normal, and now he is even more abnormal than before"

"What do you mean?"

"He's 19 and has been a prisoner for since he was 14; he sees everything Voldemort does through his eyes; he feels every curse Voldemort casts; he has both the death eaters and most of the wizarding world wanting him dead; he is the only one who can defeat Voldemort but he still can't even hear his name without violently flinching even though he used to be able to say it himself; and now, he just says 'him'; and now, he has a power that is all but unheard of; and those are just the high points" he finished with his head in his hands.

"Sirius, he's stronger than most think, it will be tough, but he will come to terms with it just like he did with his parseltongue ability"

"I hope you're right, Remus. We should talk to Albus and decide when the best time to tell Harry about this is" he said as he got to his feet and Remus followed him from the room toward the headmasters office.

After a long walk through the school, the pair came to the headmasters office and following the obligatory lemon drop, they began the discussion. Remus and Sirius told the headmaster all they had discovered, and he only nodded his head to show them that they were correct in their assumptions.

"Very good, gentlemen, I had anticipated that I still had several days before anyone realized what Harry was, but clearly I underestimated your abilities"

"Well, now that we know what kind of power Harry has, just how do you propose we teach him to control it?" asked Sirius

"The same way we teach students to control any of their powers, through trial and error" answered the headmaster with a small twinkle.

"Albus, do you realize that unlike transfiguration, Harry's power could kill himself or someone else if he looses control?" asked Remus in shock, the normally composed man almost frantic with worry.

"Remus, I am well aware of the risks, but what you don't realize is that I have control over my abilities and if Harry were to loose control, a strong enough wind could douse the flames. I know it is risky, but we have little choice in the matter. Now, onto other matters, I believe that Harry has recovered enough to begin testing his magical knowledge to see what remains of his education and to see where to begin his education again. I will have the professors compile the end of term tests for first through fourth year and if you two could administer them over the next two days. That way, we will be able to establish where his strengths and weaknesses are and where to begin with his private lessons. Furthermore, Poppy has informed me that he need not remain in the hospital wing after tomorrow, so we need establish quarters for him where the students won't stumble across them and procure clothing and lesson supplies while we are in diagon alley this weekend"

"You're going to keep Harry locked up away from the rest of the school? Why?" asked Sirius in confusion

"Mr. Black, remember that as far as everyone that is not involved in the order is concerned, Harry is not only a traitor who personally killed over a thousand people, but he is also dead. Now, if those who lost loved ones to the imposters wand saw Harry walking around the castle, there is no telling what they would do to him. No, I fear that the only thing we can do for now is keep Harry safe in quarters, at least until he is capable of defending himself" he finished "Although" he added as an afterthought "I believe we could design quarters between each of yours and erect a passage between the three" he said, and a small smile graced his features.

"That would be great, Albus" said Sirius, a smile on his own face.

"Wait, Albus, how are going to test Harry's abilities when he doesn't have a wand?" asked Remus

"Give him this when you see him tonight" said the headmaster as he opened a drawer in his desk and withdrew a wand that was made of very dark wood with light veins snaking around it in a beautiful pattern.

"Sir, that's not Harry's wand" said Sirius needlessly

"I am aware of that, but unfortunately, I believe Harry's wand is either in the hands of Voldemort or was destroyed long ago. I spoke to Mr. Ollivander several weeks ago and explained to him what had happened to Harry and he constructed a wand made exclusively for him. The wood is a combination of cherry, holly, and birch, the core is a feather from Fawkes, like his old wand, but it also contains a basilisk scale. These two cores combined give him an advantage over Voldemort because they, like Harry, are polar opposites and therefore are stronger than either one alone."

"How is that like Harry?" asked Sirius

"Half of his strength comes from Tom Riddle, like his parseltongue ability, and the other half is his own power, taken from his heritage and his many experiences. Like a phoenix rises from the ashes, so has Harry. Starting when he was a year old and everything was taken from him, through his youth when he was belittled and abused, into his Hogwarts years when he has had to overcome a plethora of different things. Through all of this, he is still a good person who only continues to get stronger with his experiences, like the phoenix" he finished

"But can Harry truly overcome all that he has been through this time?" asked Remus quietly

"I believe, that in time, he can and will overcome this too. It's part of who he is. He has never stopped fighting if there was even the smallest chance that he could win. He just needs us to stand by him and help him overcome everything. If it is possible, Harry will be the one to do it."

"But he's been through so much, how is it possible that he will ever be back to normal" asked Remus

"We will never know the extent of what Voldemort did to Harry while he was a prisoner, but I know it was worse than anyone could even begin to imagine, because of this, we need to help him as much as he will let us, and in the end, he will recover" he finished as he stood and the two men, knowing that this was their cue, stood as well and after Sirius took the strange wand on the desk, they made their way from the office back to the hospital wing.

_The street was brightly lit, and the sounds of children playing could be heard over the gentle breeze and singing of the birds. The trees that lined the street were just starting to change color in preparation for the autumn that was steadily approaching, but the majority were still a bright green color. As he walked down the street, he could occasionally glimpse the movement of a black robe out of the corner of his eye, but he knew they were there, he wouldn't be seeing this if they weren't._

_He had given up trying to escape long ago, he knew there was no way he could leave until it was over. He had made the decision to watch the proceedings and learn as much as possible. Silently, they approached the large building at the end of the street, a building with a sign over the locked gate which read St. Catherine's. _

_He knew at once what was going to happen. This was an orphanage, a muggle orphanage, and it would make it the sixth he had witnessed fall. With a quick spell, the gates creaked open and impassive eyes watched as thirty cloaked figures filed through them silently before the last turned and secured the locks behind them, effectively preventing any from escaping and a silencing notice-me-not spell was cast around the entire premises. _

_As one, the group marched to the door and a loud click signaled the spell that had unlocked the door. Regally, he walked through the door and was met at once by a girl, approximately fifteen, with shoulder length brown hair and confused hazel eyes._

"_How can I help you?" she asked after a moment of awkward silence._

"_Scream" he responded as he leveled his wand and muttered "Crucio" and at once her body crumpled to the floor and she began to scream in agonizing pain._

_That was the cue for the others as they spread out and began to gather all of the residents of the orphanage. As was their norm, they physically dragged everyone to the main dining hall and unceremoniously tossed them into a corner while their master continued to physically torture the teen in the hallway, varying occasionally from the unforgivable curse to more elaborate such as cutting curses and several others before her mind broke he carelessly ended her life with a quick flash of green before turning and waking into the main hall where nearly a hundred captives were held at wand point by his followers. As he waited, the remaining eight men walked into the room and nodded that everyone had been brought into the hall._

"_Who are you? What do you want?" asked the elderly woman who was obviously in charge._

"_My name is Lord Voldemort, and I don't want much, just some entertainment for my loyal followers" he said, and he felt his mouth twist into a cruel smile._

"_Where is Ashlee?" she demanded, not noticing just how perilous her position was._

"_Dead" was all he said and at once, the whimpering increased tenfold and the older faces in the crowd paled dramatically._

"_Lucius, as a reward for your services in the last battle, you may go first" he said and with a twisted smile, the blonde aristocrat strode forward and surveyed the trembling mass before him for several silent moments before he reached out and grabbed the wrist of a girl no older than the first years at Hogwarts with pale blonde hair and light brown eyes and tears streaking down her cheeks and drug her from the room, ignoring her vain struggles and the cries of her friends. One by one after that, the rest of his inner circle chose their 'rewards' and exited the room, leaving him with seventeen of his lower ranking followers. He surveyed the captives before him in silence before speaking in his customary cold tones._

"_Bring them" he said and instantly, a black robed figure reached into the group and grabbed the arm of a five year old boy, eyes filled with fear. He whimpered slightly as he was thrown to the ground at his feet and looked into the blood red eyes in terror. Lifting his wand in silence, a dark blue beam shot out and struck the boy in the chest, causing a faint orange glow to surround him for an instant before he was pulled to his feet again and thrown into another corner and a three year old girl took his place. The same beam shot out of his wand and the girl was surrounded in a bright yellow light._

"_Well, my child, this is your lucky day" he said as he motioned for her to be taken and she was almost caringly lifted from the ground by a black robed figure who carried her from the hall and into another room. The process continued like this for nearly forty-five minutes with only three other children joining the first girl in the other room before the entire group had been sorted, the girls who had been taken earlier returning toward the end with fresh tears on their cheeks, as well as the inner circle._

"_Too bad the rest of you weren't born worthy" was all he said before he waved his hand and the curses began raining down on the huddled group of children and their caretakers. After watching in silence for a few moments, he brought his own wand up and began to join his followers. A sick feeling of joy spreading through him at the simple pleasure of causing others pain. The torture continued for nearly three hours before the last Avada Kedavra was cast and silence rang in the hall. After surveying the scene of death and destruction for a moment, he turned and walked purposefully through the blood on the floor and opened the door at the other end and walking into the small room and facing the children huddled there. Apart from the three year old girl, there was a brunette boy who appeared to be no more than eight, and a infant boy who was being cradled protectively by the blonde girl that Lucius had taken upon their arrival. _

"_Children, you have been spared today on account of your blood being worthy. You are all members of the wizarding world and as such, you will each be given to one of my faithful followers who will instruct you in the ways of the wizarding world and raise you as my faithful followers. Now, if you would be so kind as to follow me and remember this warning, if you ever attempt to escape from your caretaker, or refuse to do whatever they ask of you, they have my permission to use any means necessary in order to ensure obedience and if you still resist, you will be brought before me and I will make sure you either obey or you will not see the light of another day" he said, his eyes lingering on the older two, knowing the other two were too young to disobey an adult and would likely not remember anything before they were given to his death eaters. After surveying his newest acquisitions once more, he turned to his death eaters "Gordon, you take the infant, Masters, the youngest girl, Andrews, the oldest boy, Malfoy, you take your prize" he said, briefly noticing the excited look on his highest ranking followers eyes before striding out of the room again and waking through the lake of blood covering the floor of the hall before leaving through the front doors, his followers on his heels. As they secured the gate behind them, he raised his wand and fired his mark into the sky as his followers disapparated around him, the three oldest children being drug behind their new guardians and the infant being carried reverently in the arms of Gordon. Right before they disapparated, the girl with Malfoy looked right at him and a flicker of confusion crossed her tear streaked face._

"_Lucius, wait" he called, and immediately, the blonde turned and bowed his head in respect._

"_My lord?" he asked, slight confusion evident in his eyes._

"_I have changed my mind, Lucius." He began and at once, the girl whimpered slightly as the iron grip around her arm tightened._

"_I fear I don't understand, master" he said after several silent moments passed._

"_I'm afraid that you will not be able to take the child with you. Potter is still out there somewhere and until he is found, I want you to lead the search. I'm afraid that this assignment will not leave you enough time in which to properly train the girl. Perhaps, once he has been returned to me, then I will let you chose another to take her place" he said, his eyes narrowed at the other man, daring him to argue with his decision._

_Lucius Malfoy was many things, but stupid was not one of them "As you wish, master, but who would you like me to deliver the girl too?"_

"_It depends on how powerful she is. I can see you fancy her, so I will make you a deal. If she is at least a half blood, then I will allow her to live, but if she is muggleborns, then she dies. As it is, she is almost too old to begin training her in our ways, but we shall leave it up to fate" he said as he lifted his wand and cast a very strong beam of dark green light on the girl which enveloped her before flashing two quick pulses before dissipating. :I must say, child, I am rarely surprised, but you have made me so today" he said, his face again twisting in a cruel smile._

"_Why?" she asked hesitantly, her eyes wide with fear_

"_Because, not only have we managed to find two witches and two wizards in this wretched orphanage, but you aren't even muggleborns. Both of your parents were magical making you pureblooded. Tell me, what is your name?"_

"_Alyssa" she answered quietly._

"_And do you know your surname?"_

"_Pierson" she responded_

"_Ah, I knew your parents, briefly" said the dark lord "How old are you?"_

"_I'll be eleven tomorrow" she responded_

"_That would have made you six when we met, but you weren't home the night they died, were you?"_

"_I was at a neighbors playing" she responded_

"_It is lucky for you that you were, for had you been home, we wouldn't be having this discussion today, for you would have perished with the muggle loving fools. But that is all in the past now, isn't it?"_

"_What are you talking about?" she demanded, her strength slowly returning in the face of her parent's killer._

"_I will be brief, but I will tell you what you want to know. I came to your house that night with my heir, Harry Potter, to teach him the fine art of torture and killing. Your parents were both ministry workers who openly opposed me but had mediocre powers, so I thought that they would make easy targets for him to practice on. Needless to say, you know very well how the story ended, but now you have a second chance. Learn your lessons well and you will advance quickly through my ranks"_

"_What are you going to do with me?" she asked in fear_

"_Since Lucius has a mission at the moment, I will be sending you to stay with his son, Draco. He will take care of you until it is time for you to go to Hogwarts, for which you will be receiving your letter tomorrow. Periodically, he will visit the castle to ensure that you are keeping your end of the deal we spoke of earlier and come next summer, you will come home to him for break and he will bring you before me to show me what you have accomplished"_

"_What if I tell someone there what you're doing to me?" she asked and she heard Lucius laugh slightly behind her._

"_Then I will hunt you down and kill you in the most painful way imaginable as well as the other children taken from here" said the dark lord and she could see the seriousness behind his eyes._

_Nodding her head, her gaze dropped to the pavement below her until he spoke again "Now, I have a mission for you to accomplish while you are at Hogwarts. A possession of mine has gone missing, and if you hear any mention of it, I expect you to send word immediately"_

"_What is it?" she asked, clearly confused_

"_Harry Potter. I know Dumbledore will keep him at the castle if he finds him, and if he does, I want to know about it at once" he hissed._

"_Yes sir" she responded quietly, dropping her gaze again._

"_Good girl. Lucius, take her to your son and meet me at the manor in one hour for your instructions" he said before the two pops sounded and the street was once again empty. The birds were still singing and the breeze was still whispering through the trees, but there were no sounds of playing children to be heard._


	16. Repercussions

Chapter 16-Repercussions

Harry awoke with a gasp in the hospital wing as he sat up straight and his head hit something above him with a loud thump.

"Merlin, that's going to leave a mark!" exclaimed someone before he felt hands on his shoulders.

Jerking roughly away from the hands, he moved to the far side of the bed, his eyes out of focus and his ears ringing with the screams of children, his body wracked with tremors and his head feeling like it would split from the pain.

"Harry, listen to me, it's Sirius" said the voice again and he turned his head slightly to look at the figure beside him before his mind caught up with his body and he let out a breath he didn't realize he had been holding as he slumped back into his pillows "Here, drink this" and he felt the smooth edge of a vial against his lips and swallowed obediently, welcoming the numbness that spread through his body. Though the pains were still very present, the potion took the edge off enough that he was able to focus more on what was going on around him.

Madame Pomfrey was waving her wand over him and reading the writing that was appearing on a parchment in her hand. Snape was hunched over the potions cabinet in the corner pulling out several different vials and placing them on top of the cabinet. Remus was helping Dumbledore hold Sirius' head still while they performed a spell to staunch the flow of blood streaming from his nose. All of these sights only served to confuse him until he began to take a serious inventory of his own body.

Every muscle ached and he could feel the spasms running up and down his arms and legs. His throat felt shredded and he could taste blood in his mouth around his swollen tongue. His entire body was wet and sticky, and after carefully moving his head to look at his chest and his arms, he could see not only a thin layer of sweat had soaked his pajamas, but there were several dark red areas staining his pajamas as well as the sheets below him. Frightened, he turned to look at his godfather who had just returned to the side of the bed, his nose no longer bleeding, but the skin looking slightly swollen.

"What happened?" he asked, his throat grating and causing him to wince.

"You have been caught in a vision for over three hours. The worst one yet. How are you feeling?" asked the older man in concern, taking the shaking hand in his own.

"Hurts" was all he could rasp out before he remembered the vision and his eyes snapped open and into focus immediately. "Dumbledore?"

"I'm here Harry" said the aged headmaster

"There was an attack. St. Catherine's orphanage. Everyone' s dead. Took four, two boys, two girls. Andrews, Gordon, Masters, the oldest going to Draco. Alyssa Pierson. First year. Wants her to spy. Sent Malfoy on mission to find me" even though his thoughts couldn't form complete sentences, the headmaster knew what he was saying and nodded his head gravely.

"Thank you Harry. Try and get some rest now, we will talk when you have recovered" he said and he approached Remus and motioned Sirius over as Snape came forward and helped him drink the six potions he had gathered, the last sending him to sleep as soon as he had swallowed it before he too joined the group with Madame Pomfrey.

"Albus, the visions are getting worse, his body can't take much more of the Cruciatus curse. He was under it for almost three consecutive hours today, completely reversing all the progress he had made up until now" said the nurse in concern "The nerve damage is almost to the point where it can not be healed at all and the strain on his heart sent him into cardiac arrest for a full five minutes before we got him back. If this continues, we will loose him next time" she said

"We have to figure something out, but so far all of my research has been in vain. We can only hope that Voldemort will lay low for a while so Harry can recuperate. If any of you finds anything that can help with this, please let me know, we need a solution to this problem and we need it now" he said before turning and leaving the room to await Draco who would most certainly be bring Miss. Pierson to him as soon as his father left.

It was three days before Harry awoke. Three agonizing days of fear that Voldemort would strike again and destroy what precious little was left of the boy-who-lived.

When he awoke, the first thing he noticed was the sound of several people talking somewhere nearby before the pain coursing through his body overwhelmed him and a sharp gasp was torn from his throat.

Sirius and Snape were at his side in an instant, the rest of the group hanging back slightly to let them attend to Harry.

"Harry, drink this" said Sirius and obediently, he swallowed the icy potion and felt the pain subside slightly and he was able to open his eyes to see those of his former professor.

"Mr. Potter" he began, but stopped when the boy clamped his eyes shut and his entire body tensed. Confused, he looked to Sirius who looked just as baffled before he had a thought and tried again "Harry" he said in as soothing of a voice as he could manage and when he received no ill response, he continued "Harry, I need you to drink this potion" he said, but the boy made no effort to take the goblet from his hands, instead looking blankly at the potion masters face.

"Why?" he finally rasped out through his sore throat.

"Pardon?" was all he could come up with in response.

"Why are you giving it to me and not Poppy or Sirius? You never give me potions" he said bluntly, his mind still not quite caught up with his consciousness.

Clearly baffled, Snape just looked at the black haired youth before him for several moments before he came up with a response "Harry, this potion has never been tested, in fact, I just created it two days ago in hopes that it will be able to block the visions you suffer from" he said at last.

"No" was the only response he received

"What?" said six voices at once.

"I won't take it" and for the first time, Harry's eyes were clearly focused and it was obvious that he knew just what he was saying.

"Why not?" asked Dumbledore, being the first to regain his speech patterns.

"Because, if I stopped having the visions, I would stop learning of his plans before he could execute them. As grateful as I am that you have been able to brew a potion that might help, I can't risk not having these visions. Too many people would die"

"Harry, you don't understand. These visions are killing you. The last one caused your heart to stop for nearly five minutes before we could get it going again and the damage to your nerves and muscles is already irreversible. If you keep having them, you will die" said the potions master in rare concern.

"No offense, but if they were going to kill me, they would have while I was in the manor or Azkaban, not while I was finally recuperating somewhat" responded Harry and his statement caused the room to fall silent because they all knew what he said was very true.

"But the pain they cause you…" Sirius said quietly

"Sirius, the pain from the visions is tolerable compared to the real pain I have felt" he said before turning again to face Snape "but if you could brew a potion that would block the pain but allow the visions. I would be forever grateful" he said with a grim smile.

"I'll see what I can do, Harry" replied the potions master before he nodded to those in the room and left.

Suddenly remembering the vision from a few days ago, Harry's green eyes sought out the blue ones of the headmaster "Where is Alyssa?" he asked.

"She is staying with Draco until school starts next week" answered the older man

"Is she ok?" he asked, knowing the young girl had been through a lot during the attack.

"She will be, we modified her memory about certain things that happened at the orphanage, but she remembers the attack for the most part. I am hoping that when she comes to Hogwarts she will make friends and be able to move past this. And before you ask, we have led raids on the houses of the other deatheaters who were given children and have brought them to the orphanage Molly and Ginny have established, so they too are safe" he replied with a smile and Harry felt relief wash over him at the news.

"Thank you, sir" he said through a yawn.

"Why don't you get some sleep, it looks like the mild sleeping draught we gave you has started to kick in" said Sirius with a smile at Harry's half hearted glare.

"Is everything still on for Diagon Alley tomorrow?" he asked as he stifled another yawn

"Yes, everything's set up and all the groups are scheduled for arrival" replied Sirius

"Am I still going?"

"Are you up for it?" asked his godfather in concern

"As much as I'll ever be" he replied with a shrug

"Ok then, I'll be up here for you at eight, but you will stay on lookout, not with any groups, you're not ready to spend hours hiking around the alley" said Sirius firmly

"Ok, if you insist" he mumbled before he slumped back and was asleep in an instant.

The next morning dawned unseasonably cold and slightly overcast, causing all those bound for Diagon Alley to don thick jumpers . When Sirius arrived in the hospital wing, he was surprised to see Harry already up and dressed sitting in a chair beside the large window. He turned abruptly upon hearing the soft footfalls on the stone floor and relaxed slightly upon seeing his godfather. Sirius smiled at him and came to a stop next to the teens chair.

"Are you sure you're up for this?" he asked with no preamble

"No offence, Sirius, but if I don't do this now, I never will" said Harry grimly

"But you just woke up yesterday after being unconscious for three days, no one would think less of you if you stayed behind and got some rest"

"All I've done since I got back is rest, I need too get out of this castle, if only for a few hours. I need to do this"

"Ok then, Dumbledore asked me to give you this" he said as he drew the peculiar wand from his pocket and held it out for the boy.

"Whose wand it that?" asked Harry, his brow furrowed

"Yours, apparently, Albus asked Ollivander to make it for you" said Sirius

"I forgot, He took mine in the graveyard, I never found out what happened to it" he said quietly as he took the wand from his godfather. As soon as his hand gripped the dark wood, brilliant sparks of scarlet, gold, and black shot from the tip and drifted gently to the rug under their feet.

"Well, it certainly looks as though the wand accepts you" said Sirius with a smile

"It feels so different from my other one" said Harry as he surveyed the bright veins winding around the wand. "what is the core?" he asked suddenly

"Phoenix feather and basilisk fang" responded Sirius

"Two different cores? How does it work then, wouldn't the magic from one cancel out the other?"

"I thought the same thing, but according to Albus, the each core draws strength from a different part of your magic. Something about polar opposites working better together under certain circumstances than they would work separately. That's all I know for sure, you'll have to ask Albus for a more detailed explanation" he said ruefully.

"I'll speak to him tonight, but if we don't leave now, we'll be late meeting the others" said Harry as he got to his feet, only to immediately have his knees buckle. If it weren't for Sirius who seemed to be expecting this, he would have fallen to the floor. "Thanks he said as he straightened his legs and regained his balance before he began to walk slowly to the door, his godfather beside him. Fifteen minutes later the pair entered the great hall and met up with the forty witches and wizards who would accompany them to the alley. Among these, Harry saw Ron, Hermione, Neville, and Ginny, as well as many other familiar faces including the rest of the surviving Weasley family and most of the staff of the castle.

"Now that we are all present, let us review today's mission" said Dumbledore as Harry and Sirius joined Remus at the back of the group, nearest the staircase they had just descended. "Would you each report to the leader of the group that you have been assigned to for the day?" he asked and a great shuffling took place as everyone sought out their respective groups. Several minutes later found Harry and Sirius joined by four others and Remus surrounded by his own group near them.

"Ok, here's the plan" said Sirius "We will be stationed on the roof of The Leaky Cauldron as a lookout for those exiting the pub as well as to guard the backs of those leaving the alley. Each group on the ground will consist of six non order members and two members. A further twenty members and loyal aurors will be scattered throughout the alley under invisibility cloaks. Now, here's the important part, no one leaves their post no matter what, and no curses will be fired unless I give the ok. We don't want to give our location away unless absolutely necessary. Just keep your eyes open and your wands at the ready and hopefully all of this preparation will be for nothing and Voldemort and his followers will stay away today" he said as he shook hands with the other four and turned to look at the other groups to see if it was time to go yet. Harry took this opportunity to look at the rest of the group. He knew that the only reason he was stationed with this group was so that Sirius could keep an eye on him, but the others were expert spell casters and had circumstances been different, they would have all made excellent hit wizards, a job that Sirius had held until his imprisonment.

Other than the pair of them, there was a witch by the name of Michelle DePardeau, a Beaubatons graduate a few years older than Harry, and a witch Sirius's age named Alexandra Wheeler, and two wizards named Anthony Fields and Jeremy Sampson. Both were in their thirties and had been unspeakables before the ministry had been destroyed. The memories that the destruction of the head of the wizarding worlds government still caused Harry nightmares and that had been three years ago. So far, only the aurors had recovered and that was only because most of them had not been present during the attack, instead, much to His displeasure, they had been sent out only ten minutes before on a top secret raid of a suspected gathering area of the death eaters. As a result, they had suffered very minor losses in comparison and had been able to relocate to Hogwarts and continue their jobs with very little interruption.

"All right, if everyone is ready, we shall leave by the portkeys your leaders have. Good luck and be safe" said Dumbledore and immediately, the hall began to clear out as various groups disappeared.

"OK, everyone take hold" said Sirius holding out an old quill and as soon as they had all touched it, they were spinning away and found themselves standing on the roof of the pub, Harry only on his feet because Sirius had gripped his elbow before the portkey had activated.

"I hate portkeys" he grumbled and he heard the others chuckle around him.

"Ok, folks, lets get down to business. Michelle, you stay here, Anthony I want you there, Jeremy, you over here, and Alex, you go over there" he said and the four stationed themselves where he directed, one behind each slightly raised area of the roof, and himself and Harry in the middle. "Harry, I want you to stay with me, and promise me that you will let me know immediately if you begin to feel the least bit tired, ok?"

"Don't worry, Sirius, I'll be fine" he said with a small smile, watching the flock of birds fly overhead and savoring the sight and feel of the sliver of sunlight on his face and the cool breeze ruffling his still loose slacks and jumper. It was amazing how good those small things would feel after so long without them.

"Just stay safe, I can't stand to loose you again"

"I will" he said with what he hoped was a reassuring smile


End file.
